GIFT  OF 
Dr.   Horace  Ivie 


GENERAL     HISTORY 


FOR 


COLLEGES   AND   HIGH   SCHOOLS. 


BY 


P.  V.  N.  MYERS,  A.M., 

Althor  of  "Ancient  History,"  and  "Medieval  and 
Modern  History." 


>:•;< 


Boston,  U.S.A.,  and  London: 

GINN   &  COMPANY,  PUBLISHERS. 

1890. 


GTFTOF 

Entered  at  Stationers'  Hall. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1889,  by 

P.  V.  N.  MYERS, 
in  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


All  Rights  Reserved. 

.  -DvJCA-noN  DEFT 


•  0        » 


Typography  by  J.  S.  Cushing  &  Co.,  Boston,  U.S.A. 
Presswork  by  Ginn  &  Co.,  Boston,  U.S.A. 


PREFACE. 


THIS  volume  is  based  upon  my  Ancient  History  and  Mediozval 
a  fid  Modern  History.  In  some  instances  I  have  changed 
the  perspective  and  the  proportions  of  the  narrative ;  but  in  the 
main,  the  book  is  constructed  upon  the  same  lines  as  those  drawn 
for  the  earlier  works.  In  dealing  with  so  wide  a  range  of  facts, 
and  tracing  so  many  historic  movements,  I  cannot  hope  that  I 
have  always  avoided  falling  into  error.  I  have,  however,  taken 
the  greatest  care  to  verify  statements  of  fact,  and  to  give  the 
latest  results  of  discovery  and  criticism. 

Considering  the  very  general  character  of  the  present  work,  an 
enumeration  of  the  books  that  have  contributed  facts  to  my 
narration,  or  have  helped  to  mould  my  views  on  this  or  that 
subject,  would  hardly  be  looked  for ;  yet  I  wish  here  to  acknowl- 
edge my  special  indebtedness,  in  the  earlier  parts  of  the  history, 
to  the  works  of  George  Rawlinson,  Sayce,  Wilkinson,  Brugsch, 
Grote,  Curtius,  Mommsen,  Merivale,  and  Leighton ;  and  in  the 
later  parts,  and  on  special  periods,  to  the  writings  of  Hodgkin, 
Emerton,  Ranke,  Freeman,  Michaud,  Bryce,  Symonds,  Green 
(J.  R.),  Motley,  Hallam,  Thiers,  Lecky,  Baird,  Miiller. 

Several  of  the  colored  maps,  with  which  the  book  will  be  found 
liberally  provided,  were  engraved  especially  for  my  Ancient  His- 
tory; but  the  larger  number  are  authorized  reproductions  of 
charts  accompanying  Professor  Freeman's  Historical  Geography  of 
Europe.    The  Roman  maps  were  prepared  for  Professor  William 

924213 


iv  PREFACE. 

F.  Allen's  History  of  Rome,  which  is  to  be  issued  soon,  and  it 
is  to  his  courtesy  that  I  am  indebted  for  their  use. 

The  illustrations  have  been  carefully  selected  with  reference  to 
their  authenticity  and  historical  truthfulness.  Many  of  those  in 
the  Oriental  and  Greek  part  of  the  work  are  taken  from  Oscar 
Jager's  Weltgeschichte  ;  while  most  of  those  in  the  Roman  portion 
are  from  Professor  Allen's  forthcoming  work  on  Rome,  to  which  I 
have  just  referred,  the  author  having  most  generously  granted  me 
the  privilege  of  using  them  in  my  work,  notwithstanding  it  is  to 
appear  in  advance  of  his. 

Further  acknowledgments  of  indebtedness  are  also  due  from 
me  to  many  friends  who  have  aided  me  with  their  scholarly  sug- 
gestions and  criticism.  My  warmest  thanks  are  particularly  due 
to  Professor  W.  F.  Allen,  of  the  University  of  Wisconsin ;  to  Dr. 
E.  W.  Coy,  Principal  of  Hughes  High  School,  Cincinnati ;  to  Pro- 
fessor William  A.  Merrill,  of  Miami  University  ;  and  to  Mr.  D.  H. 
Montgomery,  author  of  The  Leading  Facts  of  History  series. 

P.  V.  N.  M. 

College  Hill,  Ohio, 
July,  1889. 


TABLE    OF    CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Preface iii 

List  of  Maps x 

General  Introduction:  The  Races  and  their  Early  Migrations.       i 


Part  I. 

ANCIENT   HISTORY. 
Section  I.  —  Thk  Eastern  Nations. 

CHAPTER 

I.    India  and  China. 

I.India 8 

2.  China 12 

II.    Egypt. 

1.  Political  History 18 

2.  Religion,  Arts,  and  General  Culture 27 

III.  Chaldaea. 

1.  Political  History 40 

2.  Arts  and  General  Culture 43 

IV.  Assyria. 

1.  Political  History 48 

2.  Religion,  Arts,  and  General  Culture 52 

V.   Babylonia 58 

VI.  The  Hebrews 63 

VII.   The  Phoenicians 70 

VIII.   The  Persian  Empire. 

1.  Political   History 74 

2.  Government,  Religion,  and   Arts 82 

Section  II.  —  Grecian  History. 

I X.   The  Land  and  the  People 87 

X.   The  legendary  <»r   I  leroic  Age 93 


vi  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XI.   Religion  of  the  Greeks 101 

XII.   Age  of  the  Tyrants  and  of  Colonization :  the  Early  Growth 
of  Sparta  and  of  Athens. 

1.  Age  of  the  Tyrants  and  of  Colonization 109 

2.  The  Growth  of  Sparta 112 

3.  The  Growth  of  Athens 117 

XIII.  The  Gnsco-Persian  Wars 125 

XIV.  Period  of  Athenian  Supremacy 136 

XV.  The    Peloponnesian    War:    the    Spartan    and    the    Theban 

Supremacy. 

1.  The  Peloponnesian  War 147 

2.  The  Spartan  and  the  Theban  Supremacy 155 

XVI.   Period  of  Macedonian  Supremacy:  Empire  of  Alexander. . .  159 

XVII.   States  formed  from  the  Empire  of  Alexander 170 

XVIII.   Greek  Architecture,  Sculpture,  and  Painting. 

1.  Architecture 176 

2.  Sculpture  and   Painting 182 

XIX.   Greek  Literature. 

1.  Epic  and  Lyric  Poetry 190 

2.  The  Drama  and  Dramatists —  .  193 

3.  History  and   Historians 196 

4.  Oratory 198 

XX.   Greek  Philosophy  and  Science 203 

XXI.   Social  Life  of  the  Greeks 215 

Section  III.  —  Roman  History. 

XXII.  The  Roman  Kingdom 222 

XXIII.  The  Early  Roman  Republic :  Conquest  of  Italy 232 

XXIV.  The  First  Punic  War 247 

XXV.  The  Second  Punic  War 254 

XXVI.   The  Third  Punic  War 267 

XXVII.   The  Last  Century  of  the  Roman  Republic 273 

XXVIII.   The  Last  Century  of  the  Roman  Republic  {concluded) 285 

XXIX.  The  Roman  Empire  (from  31  B.C.  to  A.D.  180) 305 

XXX.    Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  West  (a.d. 

180-476) 324 

XXXI.   Roman  Civilization. 

1.  Architecture 350 

2.  Literature,  Philosophy,  and  Law 354 

3.  Social  Life 31-9 


CONTENTS.  vn 
Part  II. 

MEDIEVAL,   AND   MODERN   HISTORY. 

PAGE 

Introduction 366 

Section  I.  —  Mediaeval  History. 

FIRST   PERIOD.  — THE    DARK   AGES. 

(From  the  Fall  of  Rome,  a.d.  476,  to  the  Eleventh  Century.) 
CHAPTER 

XXXII.   Migrations  and  Settlements  of  the  Teutonic  Tribes 371 

XXXIII.  The  Conversion  of  the  Barbarians , 377 

XXXIV.  Fusion  of  the  Latin  and  Teutonic  Peoples 385 

XXXV.   The  Roman  Empire  in  the  East 389 

XXXVI.    Mohammed  and  the  Saracens 392 

XXXVII.   Charlemagne  and  the  Restoration  of  the  Empire  in  the  West  403 

XXXVIII.  The  Northmen 410 

XXXIX.   Rise  of  the  Papal  Power 414 

SECOND  PERIOD.  — THE  AGE  OF  REVIVAL. 

(From  the  opening  of  the  Eleventh  Century  to  the  Discovery  of  America  by 
Columbus,  in  1492.) 

XL.    Feudalism  and  Chivalry. 

1.  Feudalism 421 

2.  Chivalry 429 

XLI.  The  Norman  Conquest  of  England 433 

XLII.  The  Crusades. 

1.  Introductory :  Causes  of  the  Crusades 438 

2.  The  First  Crusade 441 

3.  The  Second  Crusade 443 

4.  The  Third  Crusade 444 

5.  The  Fourth  Crusade 446 

6.  Close  of  the  Crusades :  Their  Results 447 

XLIII.   Supremacy  of  the  Papacy:  Decline  of  its  Temporal  Power..  452 

XLI V.   Conquests  of  the  Turanian  Tribes 460 

XLV.   Growth  of  the  Towns:  The  Italian  City- Republics 464 

XLVI.  The  Revival  of  Learning 471 


viii  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XLVII.   Growth  of  the  Nations :  Formation  of  National  Governments 
and  Literatures. 

i.  England 479 

2.  France 491 

3.  Spain 498 

4.  Germany 501 

5.  Russia 508 

6.  Italy 509 

7.  The  Northern  Countries 512 


Section  II.  —  Modern  History. 

Introduction 513 

THIRD  PERIOD. -THE  ERA   OF  THE  PROTESTANT  REFORMATION. 

(From  the  Discovery  of  America  to  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  in  1648.) 

XLVIII.  The  Beginnings  of  the  Reformation  under  Luther 519 

XLIX.   The  Ascendency  of  Spain. 

1.  Reign  of  the  Emperor  Charles  V. 530 

2.  Spain  under  Philip  II 535 

L.  The  Tudors  and  the  English  Reformation. 

1.  Introductory 539 

2.  The  Reign  of  Henry  VII 541 

3.  England  severed  from  the  Papacy  by  Henry  VIII 543 

4.  Changes  in  the  Creed  and  Ritual  under  Edward  VI...  550 

5.  Reaction  under  Mary 552 

6.  Final  Establishment  of  Protestantism  under  Elizabeth.  554 
LI.   The  Revolt  of  the  Netherlands :   Rise  of  the  Dutch  Republic  563 

LII.  The  Huguenot  Wars  in  France 572 

LIII.   The  Thirty  Years'  War 582 

FOURTH   PERIOD. —THE   ERA   OF  THE   POLITICAL   REVOLUTION. 

(From  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  in  1648,  to  the  present  time.) 

LIV.  The  Ascendency  of  France  under  the  Absolute  Government 

of  Louis  XIV 590 

LV.    England   under  the  Stuarts:  The  English  Revolution. 

1 .  The  first  Two  Stuarts 601 

2.  The  Commonwealth 613 


CONTENTS.  IX 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

3.  The  Restored  Stuarts 618 

4.  The  Orange- Stuarts 626 

5.  England  under  the  Earlier  Hanoverians   630 

LVI.   The  Rise  of  Russia :   Peter  the  Great 633 

LVII.   The  Rise  of  Prussia :  Frederick  the  Great 642 

LVIII.   The  French  Revolution. 

1.  Causes  of  the  Revolution:  The  States-General  of  1789..  647 

2.  The  National,  or  Constituent  Assembly ...  65 1 

3.  The  Legislative  Assembly 655 

4.  The  National  Convention 657 

5.  The  Directory 667 

LIX.   The  Consulate  and  the  First  Empire :  France  since  the  Second 

Restoration. 

1.  The  Consulate  and  the  Empire 673 

2.  France  since  the  Second  Restoration 688 

LX.    Russia  since  the  Congress  of  Vienna 692 

I  .X  I.   German  Freedom  and  Unity 700 

LXII.    Liberation  and  Unification  of  Italy 708 

LXIII.    England  since  the  Congress  of  Vienna. 

1.  Progress  towards  Democracy 715 

2.  Expansion  of  the  Principle  of  Religious  Equality 720 

3.  Growth  of  the  British  Empire  in  the  East 723 

Conclusion  :  The  New  Age 729 

Ini>kx,  Pronouncing  Vocabulary,  and  Glossary 733 


LIST   OF   COLORED    MAPS. 


PAGE 

1.  Ancient  Egypt 18 

2.  The  Tigris  and  the  Euphrates 42 

3.  Greece  and  the  Greek  Colonies in 

4.  Greece  in  the  Fifth  Century  B.c 147 

5.  Dominions  and  Dependencies  of  Alexander,  c.  B.C.  323 163 

6.  Kingdoms  of  Successors  to  Alexander,  c.  B.C.  300 171 

7.  Italy  before  the  Growth  of  the  Roman  Power 222 

8.  Mediterranean  Lands  at  the  Beginning  of  Second  Punic  War 254 

9.  Roman  Dominions  at  the  End  of  the  Mithridatic  War 282 

10.  The  Roman  Empire  under  Trajan,  A.D.  117 318 

11.  Roman  Empire  divided  into  Prefectures 333 

12.  Europe  in  the  Reign  of  Theodoric,  c.  A.D.  500 371 

13.  Europe  in  the  Time  of  Charles  the  Great,  814 408 

14.  Central  Europe,  1360 506 

15.  The   Spanish   Kingdom    and   its   European    Dependencies   under 

Charles  V 530 

16.  Central  Europe,   1801 674 

17.  Central  Europe,  1810 681 

18.  Central  Europe,  1815 684 

19.  South-Eastern  Europe  under  the  Treaty  of  Berlin,  1878 696 

20.  Europe  in  1880 705 


GENERAL  HISTORY. 

GENERAL  INTRODUCTION. 
THE   RACES  AND  THEIR   EARLY   MIGRATIONS. 

Divisions  of  History.  —  History  is  usually  divided  into  three 
periods,  —  Ancient,  Mediaeval,  and  Modern.  Ancient  History 
begins  with  the  earliest  nations  of  which  we  can  gain  any  certain 
knowledge,  and  extends  to  the  fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  in  the 
West,  a.d.  476.  Mediaeval  History  embraces  the  period,  about 
one  thousand  years  in  length,  lying  between  the  fall  of  Rome  and 
the  discovery  of  the  New  World  by  Columbus,  a.d.  1492.  Mod- 
ern History  commences  with  the  close  of  the  Mediaeval  period 
and  extends  to  the  present  time.1 

Antiquity  of  Man.  —  We  do  not  know  when  man  first  came 
into  possession  of  the  earth.  We  only  know  that,  in  ages  vastly 
remote,  when  both  the  climate  and  the  outline  of  Europe  were 
very  different  from  what  they  are  at  present,  man  lived  on  that 
continent  with  animals  now  extinct ;  and  that  as  early  as  4000  or 
3000  B.C.,  —  when  the  curtain  first  rises  on  the  stage  of  history,  — 
in  some  favored  regions,  as  in  the  Valley  of  the  Nile,  there  were 
nations  and  civilizations  already  venerable  with  age,  and  possess- 
ing languages,  arts,  and  institutions  that  bear  evidence  of  slow 

1  It  is  thought  preferable  by  some  scholars  to  let  the  beginning  of  the  great 
Teutonic  migration  (a.d.  375)  mark  the  end  of  the  period  of  ancient  history. 
Some  also  prefer  to  date  the  beginning  of  the  modern  period  from  the  capture 
of  Constantinople  by  the  Turks,  a.d.  1453;  while  still  others  speak  of  it  in  a 
general  way  as  commencing  about  the  close  of  the  15th  century,  at  which  time 
there  were  many  inventions  and  discoveries,  and  a  great  stir  in  the  intellectual 
world. 


GENERAL    INTR  OD  UC  TION. 


growth  through  very  long  periods  of  time  before  written  history 
begins.1 

The  Races  of  Mankind.  —  Distinctions  in  form,  color,  and 
physiognomy-  divide  the  human  species  into  three  chief  types,  or 
races,  known  as  the  Black  (Ethiopian,  or  Negro),  the  Yellow  (Tura- 
ui;<i>,  ftr  Mongolian)',  and  the  White  (Caucasian).  But  we  must 
not  suppose  each  of  these  three  types  to  be  sharply  marked  off  from 
the  others  ;  they  shade  into  one  another  by  insensible  gradations. 
There  has  been  no  perceptible  change  in  the  great  types  during 
historic  times.  The  paintings  upon  the  oldest  Egyptian  monu- 
ments show  us  that  at  the  dawn  of  history,  about  five  or  six  thou- 
sand years  ago,  the  principal  races  were  as  distinctly  marked  as 
now,  each  bearing  its  racial  badge  of 
color  and  physiognomy.  As  early  as  the 
times  of  Jeremiah,  the  permanency  of 
physical  characteristics  had  passed  into 
the  proverb,  "  Can  the  Ethiopian  change 
his  skin?" 

Of  all  the  races,  the  White,  or  Cau- 
casian, exhibits  by  far  the  most  perfect 
type,  physically,  intellectually,  and  mor- 
ally. 

The  Black  Race. — Africa  is  the  home 
of  the  peoples  of  the  Black  Race,  but 
we  find  them  on  all  the  other  continents,  whither  they  have  been 
carried  as  slaves  by  the  stronger  races ;  for  since  time  immemo- 
rial they  have  been  "  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water  "  for 
their  more  favored  brethren. 

The  Yellow,  or  Turanian  Race. — The  term  Turanian  is  very 
loosely  applied  by  the  historian  to  many  and  widely  separated 
families  and  peoples.  In  its  broadest  application  it  is  made  to 
include  the  Chinese  and  other  more  or  less  closely  allied  peoples 
of  Eastern  Asia ;  the  Ottoman  Turks,  the  Hungarians,  the  Finng, 

1  The  investigation  and  study  of  this  vast  background  of  human  life  is  left  to 
such  sciences  as  Ethnology,  Comparative  Philology,  and  Prehistoric  Archeology. 


NEGRO  CAPTIVES, 
From  the  Monuments  of  Thebes. 


(Illustrating  the  permanence  of  race 
characteristics.) 


THE  RACES  AND  THEIR  EARLY  MIGRATIONS.  3 

the  kapjjs,  and  the  Basques,  in  Europe  ;  and  (by  some)  the  Esqui- 
maux and  American  Indians. 

The  peoples  of  this  race  were,  it  seems,  the  first  inhabitants  of 
Europe  and  of  the  New  World ;  but  in  these  quarters,  they  have, 
in  the  main,  either  been  exterminated  or  absorbed  by  later  comers 
of  the  White  Race.  In  Europe,  however,  two  small  areas  of  this 
primitive  population  escaped  the  common  fate  —  the  Basques, 
sheltered  among  the  Pyrenees,  and  the  Finns  and  Lapps,  in  the 
far  north  j 1  while  in  the  New  World,  the  Esquimaux  and  the 
Indians  still  represent  the  race  that  once  held  undisputed  pos- 
session of  the  land. 

The  polished  stone  implements  found  in  the  caves  and  river- 
gravels  of  Western  Europe,  the  shell-mounds,  or  kitchen-middens, 
upon  the  shores  of  the  Baltic,  the  Swiss  lake-habitations,  and  the 
barrows,  or  grave-mounds,  found  in  all  parts  of  Europe,  are  sup- 
posed to  be  relics  of  a  prehistoric  Turanian  people. 

Although  some  of  the  Turanian  peoples,  as  for  instance  the 
Chinese,  have  made  considerable  advance  in  civilization,  still  as 
a  rule  the  peoples  of  this  race  have  made  but  little  progress  in  the 
arts  or  in  general  culture.  Even  their  languages  have  remained 
undeveloped.  These  seem  immature,  or  stunted  in  their  growth. 
They  have  no  declensions  or  conjugations,  like  those  of  the  lan- 
guages of  the  Caucasian  peoples. 

The  White  Race  and  its  Three  Families.  —The  White  Race 
embraces  the  historic  nations.  This  type  divides  into  three  fami- 
lies,—  the  Haniitic,  the  Semitic,  and  the  Aryan,  or  Indo-European 
(formerly  called  the  Japhetic)7 

The  ancient  Egyptians  were  the  chief  people  of  the  Hamitic 
branch.  In  the  gray  dawn  of  history  we  discover  them  already 
settled  in  the  Valley  of  the  Nile,  and  there  erecting  great  rnonji; 
ments  so  faultless  in  construction  as  to  render  it  certain  that  those 
who  planned  them  had  had  a  very  long  previous  training  in  the 
art  of  building. 

1  The  Hungarians  and  Turks  are  Turanian  peoples  that  have  thrust  them- 
selves into  Europe  during  historic  times. 


4  GENERAL    INTRODUCTION. 

The  Semitic  family  includes  among  its  chief  peoples  the  ancient 
Babylonians  and  Assyrians,  the_Hel)rews,  the  Phoenicians,  jmd  the 


Arabians.  Weare  not  certain  what  region  was  the  original  abode 
of  this  family.  We  only  know  that  by  the  dawn  of  history  its 
various  clans  and  tribes,  whencesoever  they  may  have  come,  had 
distributed  themselves  over  the  greater  part  of  Southwestern  Asia. 
It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  three  great  historic  religions  of 
the  world,  —  the  Hebrew,  the  Christian,  and  the  Mohammedan, — 
the  three  religions  that   alone    (if  we  except  that  of_Zoroaster) 

je^^jija^e^fjTijojiejGod,  arose  among  peoples  belonging  to  the 
Semitic  family. 

The  Aryan,  or  Indo-European,  though  probably  the  youngest, 
is  the  most  widely  scattered  family  of  the  White  Race.  It  jncludes 
among  its  members  the  ancient   Hindus,    Medes,  andJPersians, 

Jhe  classic  Greeks  andJRomans,  and  the  modern  descendants  of 
all  these  nations ;  also  almost  all  the  peoples ;  of  Europe^and  their 
colonists  that  have  peopled  the  New  World,  and  taken  possession 

_of  other  parts  of  the  earth.  This  is  the  family  to  which  we  our- 
selves belong.  , 

Migrations  of  the  Aryans. — The^original  seat  of  the  Aryan 
peoples  was,  it  is  conjectured,  somewhere  in  Asia.  At  a  period 
that  cannot  be  placed  later  than  3000  B.C.,  the  Aryan  household 
began  to  break  up  and  scatter,  and  the  different  clans  to  set  out 
in  search  of  new  dwelling-places.  Some  tribes  of  the  family  spread 
themselves  over  the  table-lands  of  Iran  and  the  plains  of  India, 
and  became  the  progenitors  of  the  Medes,  the  Persians,  and  the 
Hindus.  Other  clans  entering  Europe  probably  by  the  way  of  the 
Hellespont,  pushed  themselves  into  the  peninsulas  of  Greece  and 
Italy,  and  founded  the  Greek  and  Italian  states.  Still  other  tribes 
seem  to  have  poured  in  successive  waves  into  Central  Europe. 
The  vanguard  of  these  peoples  are  known  as  the  Celts.  After  them 
came  the  Teutonic  tribes,  who  crowded  the  icrmer  out  on  the 
westernmost  edge  of  Europe  —  into  Gaul  and  Spain,  and  out  upon 
the  British  Isles.  These  hard-pressed  Celts  are  represented  to-day 
by  the  Welsh,  the  Irish,  and  the   Highland  Scots.     Behind  the 


THE  RACES  AND  THEIR  EARLY  MIGRATIONS.  5 

Teutonic  peoples  were  the  Slavonic  folk,  who  pushed  the  former 
hard  against  the  Celts,  and,  when  they  could  urge  them  no  farther 
to  the  west,  finally  settled  down  and  became  the  ancestors  of  the 
Russians  and  other  kindred  nations. 

Although  these  migratory  movements  of  the  various  clans  and 
tribes  of  this  wonderful  Aryan  family  began  in  the  early  morning  of 
history,  some  five  thousand  or  more  years  ago,  still  we  must  not 
think  of  them  as  something  past  and  unrelated  to  the  present. 
These  movements,  begun  in  those  remote  times,  are  still  going  on. 
The  overflow  of  the  population  of  Europe  into  the  different  re- 
gions of  the  New  World,  is  simply  a  continuation  of  the  prehistoric 
migrations  of  the  members  of  the  primitive  Aryan  household. 

Everywhere  the  other  races  and  families  have  given  way  before 
the  advance  of  the  Aryan  peoples,  who  have  assumed  the  position 
of  leaders  and  teachers  among  the  families  of  mankind,  and  are 
rapidly  spreading  their  arts  and  sciences  and  culture  over  the 
earth. 

Early  Culture  of  the  Aryans.  —  One  of  the  most  fascinating 
studies  of  recent  growth  is  that  which  reveals  to  us  the  customs, 
beliefs,  and  mode  of  life  of  the  early  Aryans,  while  they  were  yet  liv- 
ing together  as  a  single  household.  Upon  comparing  the  myths, 
legends,  and  ballads  of  the  different  Aryan  peoples,  we  discover 
the  curious  fact  that,  under  various  disguises,  they  are  the  same. 
Thus  our  nursery  tales  are  found  to  be  identical  with  those  with 
which  the  Hindu  children  are  amused.  But  the  discovery  should 
not  surprise  us.  We  and  the  Hindus  are  kinsmen,  children  of  the 
same  home ;  so  now,  when  after  a  long  separation  we  meet,  the 
tales  we  tell  are  the  same,  for  they  are  the  stories  that  were  told 
around  the  common  hearth-fire  of  our  Aryan  forefathers. 

And  when  we  compare  certain  words  in  different  Aryan  lan- 
guages, we  often  find  them  alike  in  form  and  meaning.  Thus, 
take  the  word  father.  This  word  occurs  with  but  little  change 
of  form  in  several  of  the  Aryan  tongues.1     From  this  we  infer  that 

1  Sanscrit,  pitri  ;  Persian,  fa  Jar ;  Greek,  tot^/)  {pater);  Latin,  pater; 
German,  voter. 


6  GENERAL   INTRODUCTION. 

the  remote  ancestors  of  the  now  widely  separated  Aryan  peoples 
once  lived  together  and  had  a  common  speech. 

Our  knowledge  of  the  prehistoric  culture  of  the  Aryans,  gained 
through  the  sciences  of  comparative  philology  and  mythology,  may 
be  summed  up  as  follows:  They  personified  and  worshipped  the 
various  forces  and  parts  of  the  physical  universe,  such  as  the  Sun, 
the  Dawn,  Fire,  the  Winds,  the  Clouds.  The  all-embracing  sky 
they  worshipped  as  the  Heaven-Father  (Dyaus-Pitar,  whence 
Jupiter).  They  were  herdsmen  and  at  least  occasional  farmers. 
They  introduced  the  sheep,  as  well  as  the  horse,  into  Europe  : 
the  Turanian  people  whom  they  displaced  had  neither  of  these 
domestic  animals.  In  social  life  they  had  advanced  to  that  stage 
where  the  family  is  the  unit  of  society.  The  father  was  the  priest 
and  absolute  lord  of  his  house.  The  families  were  united  to  form 
village-communities  ruled  by  a  chief,  or  patriarch,  who  was  assisted 
by  a  council  of  elders. 

Importance  of  Aryan  Studies. — This  picture  of  life  in  the 
early  Aryan  home,  the  elements  of  which  are  gathered  in  so  novel 
a  way,  is  of  the  very  greatest  historical  value  and  interest.  In 
these  customs  and  beliefs  of  the  early  Aryans,  we  discover  the 
germs  of  many  of  the  institutions  of  the  classical  Greeks  and 
Romans,  and  of  the  nations  of  modern  Europe.  Thus,  in  the 
council  of  elders  around  the  village  patriarch,  political  historians 
trace  thebeginnings  of  the  senates~of  Greece  and  Rome  and~the 
national  parliaments  of  later  times. 

Just  as  the  teachings  of  the  parental  roof  mould  the  life  and 
character  of  the  children  that  go  out  from  under  its  discipline,  so 
have  the  influences  of  that  early  Aryan  home  shaped  the  habits, 
institutions,  and  character  of  those  peoples  and  families  that,  as 
its  children,  went  out  to  establish  new  homes  in  their  "  appointed 
habitations." 


RACES   OF  MANKIND. 


RACES   OF  MANKIND,  WITH   CHIEF  FAMILIES  AND   PEOPLES. 

Black  Race  f  Tribes  of  Central  and  Southern  Africa,  the  Papuans  and 
the  Australians.  (This  group  includes  two  great  divis- 
ions, the  Negroid  and  Australoid.) 

(i)  The  Chinese,  Burmese,  Japanese,  and  other  kindred 
peoples  of  Eastern  Asia;  (2)  the  Malays  of  Southeast- 
ern Asia,  and  the  inhabitants  of  many  of  the  Pacific 
islands;  (3)  the  nomads  (Tartars,  Mongols,  etc.)  of 
Northern  and  Central  Asia  and  of  Eastern  Russia;  (4) 
the  Turks,  the  Magyars,  or  Hungarians,  the  Finns  and 
Lapps,  and  the  Basques,  in  Europe;  (5)  the  Esquimaux 
and  the  American  Indians.  Languages  of  these  peoples 
are  monosyllabic  or  agglutinative.  (Note  that  the  Ma- 
lays and  American  Indians  were  formerly  classified  as 
distinct  races.) 


(Ethiopian,  or  -j 
Negro).  [ 


Yellow  Race 
(Turanian,  or 
Mongolian). 


White  Race 

(Caucasian). 


Hamitic 
Family 


Semitic 
Family 


f  Egyptians, 
I   Libyans, 
I  Ethiopians. 

Chaldceans  (partly  Turanian), 

Assyrians, 

Babylonians, 

Canaanites  (chiefly  Semitic), 

Phoenicians, 

Hebrews, 

Arabs. 


f  Indo-Iranic  Branch 


Groeco-Italic  Branch 


Aryan,   or 
Indo-Eu- 
ropean 
family 


Celtic  Branch 


Teutonic  Branch 


u 


Hindus, 
Medes, 
Persians. 
Greeks, 
Romans. 
Gauls, 
Britons, 
Scots  (Irish), 
Picts. 

High  Germans, 
^ow  Germans, 
Scandinavians. 


Slavonic  Branch /  Russians, 

\  Poles,  etc. 


The  peoples  of  modern  Germany  are  the  descendants  of  various  Germanic  tribes.  The 
Swedes,  Norwegians,  and  Danes  represent  the  Scandinavian  branch  of  the  Teutonic  family. 
The  Irish,  the  Welsh,  the  Scotch  Highlanders,  and  the  Bretons  of  Brittany  (anciently  Armor- 
ica),  in  France,  arc  the  present  representatives  of  the  ancient  Celts.  The  French,  Spaniards, 
icse,  and  Italians  have  sprung,  in  the  main,  from  a  blending  of  the  Celts,  the  ancient 
Romans,  and  the  Germanic  tribes  that  thrust  themselves  within  the  limits  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire in  the  West.  The  English  are  the  descendants  of  the  Angles,  Saxons,  and  Jutes  (Teu- 
tonic tribes),  slightly  modified  by  interminglincs  with  the  Danes  and  Normans  (also  of  Teu- 
tonic origin).     (See  Mediarval  and  Modern  History,  pp.  169-178.) 


Part   I. 

ANCIENT  HISTORY. 


SECTION   I.  — THE    EASTERN    NATIONS. 

CHAPTER    I. 

INDIA   AND   CHINA, 
i .    India. 

The  Aryan  Invasion.  —  At  the  time  of  the  great  Aryan  migra- 
tion (see  p.  4),  some  Aryan  bands,  journeying  from  the  northwest, 
settled  first  the  plains  of  the  Indus  and  then  occupied  the  valley 
of  the  Ganges.  They  reached  the  banks  of  the  latter  river  as 
early  probably  as  1500  B.C. 

These  fair-skinned  invaders  found  the  land  occupied  by  a  dark- 
skinned,  non-Aryan  race,  whom  they  either  subjugated  and  reduced 
to  serfdom,  or  drove  out  of  the  great  river  valleys  into  the  moun- 
tains and  the  half-desert  plains  of  the  peninsula. 

The  Origin  of  Castes.  — The  conflict  of  races  in  Northern  India 
gave  rise  to  what  is  known  as  the  system  of  castes ;  that  is,  society 
became  divided  into  a  number  of  rigid  hereditary  classes.  There 
arose  gradually  four  chief  castes:  ( 1 )  Brahmans,  or  priests ;  (2) 
warriors ;  (3)  agriculturists  and  traders  ;  and  (4)  serfs,  or  Sudras. 
The  Brahmans  were  those  of  pure  Aryan  blood,  while  the  Sudras 
were  the  despised  and  oppressed  non-Aryan  aborigines.  The 
two  middle  classes,  the  warriors  and  the  cultivators  of  the  soil, 
were  of  mixed  Aryan  and  non- Aryan  blood,     Below  these  several 


THE   VEDAS.  9 

castes  were  the  Pariahs,  or  outcasts,  the  most  degraded  of  the 
degraded  natives.1 

The  system  of  castes,  modified  however  by  various  influences, 
particularly  by  the  later  system  of  Buddhism  (see  p.  1 1),  has  char- 
acterized Hindu  society  from  the  time  the  system  originated 
down  to  the  present,  and  is  one  of  the  most  important  facts  of 
Indian  history. 

The  Vedas.  — The  most  important  of  the  sacred^  books  of  jhg__ 
Hindus  are  called  the  Vedas.  They  are  written  in  the  Sanscrit 
language,  which  is  believed  to  be  the  oldest  form  of  Aryan  speech. 
The  Rig-Veda,  the  most  ancient  of  the  books,  is  made  up  of 
hymns  which  were  composed  chiefly  during  the  long  period,  per- 
haps a  thousand  years  or  more,  while  the  Aryans  were  slowly 
working  their  way  from  the  mountains  on  the  northwest  of  India 
across  the  peninsula  to  the  Ganges.  These  hymns  are  filled  with 
memories  of  the  long  conflict  of  the  fair-faced  Aryans  with  the 
dark-faced  aborigines.  The  Himalayas,  through  whose  gloomy 
passes  the  early  emigrants  journeyed,  must  have  deeply  impressed 
the  wanderers,  for  the  poets  often  refer  to  the  great  dark  moun- 
tains. 

Brahmanism. — The  religion  of  the  Indian  Aryans  is  known  as 
Brahmanism.  This  system  gradually  developed  from  the  same 
germs  as  those  out  of  which  grew  the  Greek  and  Roman  religions. 
It  was  at  first  a  pure  nature-worship,  that  is,  the  worship  of  the 
most  striking  phenomena  of  the  physical  world  as  intelligent  and 
moral  beings.  The  chief  god  was  Dyaus-Pitar,  the  Heaven- Father. 
As  this  system  characterized  the  early  period  when  the  oldest 
Vedic  hymns  were  composed,  it  is  known  as  the  Vedic  religion. 

1  At  a  later  period,  the  Brahmans,  in  order  to  perpetuate  their  own  ascend- 
ancy and  to  secure  increased  reverence  for  their  order,  incorporated  among  the 
sacred  hymns  an  account  of  creation  which  gave  a  sort  of  divine  sanction  to 
the  system  of  castes  by  representing  the  different  classes  of  society  to  have 
had  different  origins.  The  Brahmans,  the  sacred  books  are  made  to  say,  came 
forth  from  the  mouth  of  Brahma,  the  soldier  from  his  arms,  the  farmer  from 
his  thighs,  and  the  Sudra  from  his  feet, 


10  INDIA  AND  CHINA. 

In  course  of  time  this  nature-worship  of  the  Vedic  period  de- 
veloped into  a  sort  of  pantheism,  that  is,  a  system  which  identifies 
Godwith  the  universe.  This  form  of  the  Indian  religion  is  known 
as  Brahmanism.  Brahma,  an  impersonal  essence,  is  conceived  as 
the  primal  existence.  Forth  from  Brahma  emanated,  as  heat  and 
light  emanate  from  the  sun,  alTthings  and  all  life.  Banish  a  per- 
sonal God  from  the  universe,  as  some  modern  scientists  would  do, 
leaving  nothing  but  nature  with  her  original  nebula,  her  endless 
cycles,  her  unconscious  evolutions,  and  we  have  something  very 
like  Brahmanism. 

A  second  fundamental  conception  of  Brahmanism  is  that  all 
life,  apart  from  Brahma,  is  evil,  is  travail  and  sorrow.  We~~can 
make  this  idea  intelligible  to  ourselves  by  remembering  what  are 
our  own  ideas  of  this  earthly  life.  We  call  it  a  feverish  dream,  a 
journey  through  a  vale  of  sorrow.  Now  the  Hindu  regards  all 
conscious  existence  in  the  same  light.  He  has  no  hope  in  a 
better  future ;  so  long  as  the  soul  is  conscious,  so  long  must  it 
endure  sorrow  and  pain. 

This  conception  of  all  conscious  existence  as  necessarily  and 
always  evil,  leads  naturally  to  the  doctrine  that  it  is  the  part  of 
wisdom  and  of  duty  for  man  to  get  rid  of  consciousness,  to  anni- 
hilate himself,  in  a  word,  to  commit  soul-suicide.  Brahman- 
ism teaches  that  the  only  way  to  extinguish  self  and  thus  get  rid 
of  the  burden  of  existence,  is  by  re-absorption  into  Brahma.  But 
this  return  to  Brahma  is  dependent  upon  the  soul's  purification, 
for  no  impure  soul  can  be  re-absorbed  into  the  primal  essence. 
The  necessary  freedom  from  passion  and  the  required  purity  of 
soul  can  best  be  attained  by  self-torture,  by  a  severe  mortification 
of  the  flesh  j  hence  the  asceticism  of  the  Hindu  devotee. 

As  only  a  few  in  each  generation  reach  the  goal,  it  follows  that 
the  great  majority  of  men  must  be  born  again,  and  yet  again,  until 
all  evil  has  been  purged  away  from  the  soul  and  eternal  repose 
found  in  Brahma.  He  who  lives  a  virtuous  life  is  at  death  born 
into  some  higher  caste,  and  thus  he  advances  towards  the  longed- 
for  end.    The  evil  man,  however,  is  born  into  a  lower  caste,  or 


BUDDHISM. 


11 


perhaps  his  soul  enters  some  unclean  animal.     This  doctrine  of 
re-birth  is  known  as  the  transmigration  oLsouls  (metempsychosis) . 

Onl^the  first  three  classes  are  admitted  to  the  benefits  of  relig- 
ion.  The  Sudras  and  the  outcasts  are  forbidden  to  read  the  jacred 
books,  and  for  any  one  of  the  upper  classes  to  teach  a  serf_how_ 
to  expiate  sin  is  a  crime. 

Buddhism.  —  In  the  fifth  century  before  our  era,  a  great  teacher 
and  reformer,  known  as  Buddha,  or  Gautama  (died  about  470 
b.c),  arose  in  India.  He  was 
a~prmce,  whom  legend  repre- 
sents as  being  so  touched  by 
the  universal  misery  of  man- 
kind, that  he  voluntarily  aban- 
doned the  luxury  of  his  home, 
and  spent  his  life  in  seeking 
out  and  making  known  to  men 
a  new  and  better  way  of  sal- 
vation. He  condemned  the 
severe  penances  and  the  self- 
torture  of  the  Brahmans,  yet 
commended  poverty  and  retire- 
ment from  active  life  as  the  best 
means  of  getting  rid  of  desire 
and  of  attaining  Nirvana,  that 
is,  the  repose  of  unconsciousness. 

Buddha  admitted  all  classes  to  the  benefits,  of  religion,  the  poor 
outcast  as  well  as  the  high-born  Brahman,  and  thus  Buddhism  was 
a  revolt  against  the  earlier  harsh  and  exclusive  system  of  Brah- 
manism.  It  holds  somewhat  the  same  relation  to  Brahmanism 
that  Christianity  bears  to  Judaism. 

Buddhism  gradually  gained  the  ascendancy  over  Brahmanism ; 
but  after  some  centuries  the  Brahmans  regained  their  power,  and 
by  the  eighth  century  after  Christ,  the  faith  of  Buddha  was  driven 
out  of  almost  every  part  of  India.  But  Buddhism  has  a  profound 
missionary  spirit,  like  that  of  Christianity,  Buddha  having  com- 


STATUE  OF  BUDDHA. 


12  INDIA  AND  CHINA. 

manded  his  disciples  to  make  known  to  all  men  the  way  to  Nir- 
^vana]~~and  consequently"  during  the  very~period  when  India  was 
being  lost,  the  missionaries  of  the  reformed  creed  were  spreading 
the  teachings  of  their  master  among  the  peoples  of  all  the  coun- 
tries of  Eastern  Asia,  so  that  to^iay  Buddhism  is  the  religion 
of  almost  one  third  .of  the  human  race.  Buddha  has  probably 
nearly  as  many  followers  as  both  Christ  and  MohammecL  together. 

During  its  long  conflict  with  Buddhism,  Brahmanism  was  greatly 
modified,  and  caught  much  of  the  gentler  spirit  of  the  new  faith, 
so  that  modern  Brahmanism  is  a  very  different  religion  from  that 
of  the  ancient  system ;  hence  it  is  usually  given  a  new  name, 
being  known  as  Hinduism.1 

Alexander's  Invasion  of  India  (327  B.C.). — Although  we  find 
obscure  notices  of  India  in  the  records  of  the  early  historic  peoples 
of  Western  Asia,  yet  it  is  not  until  the  invasion  of  the  peninsula 
by  Alexander  the  Great  in  327  B.C.  that  the  history  of  the  Indian 
Aryans  comes  in  significant  contact  with  that  of  the  progressive 
nations  of  the  West.  From  that  day  to  our  own  its  systems  of 
philosophy,  its  wealth,  and  its  commerce  have  been  more  or  less 
important  factors  in  universal  history.  Greece  carried  on  an  intel- 
lectuaL-«pmmerce  with  this  country ;  Rome,  and  the  Italian  repub- 
lics of  the  Middle  Ages,  a  more  material  but  not  less  important 
trade.  Columbus  was  seeking  a  short  all-sea  route  to  this  coun- 
try when  he  found  the  New  World.  And  in  the  upbuilding  of  the 
imperial  greatness  of  the  England  of  to-day,  the  wealth  and  trade 
of  India  have  played  no  inconsiderable  part. 

2.   China. 

General  Remarks :  the  Beginning.  —  China  is  the  seat  of  a 
very  old  civilization,  older  perhaps  than  that  of  any  other  land 
save  Egypt;  yet  Chinese  affairs  have  not  until  recently  exerted 
any  appreciable  influence  upon  the  general  current  of  history. 

1  Among  the  customs  introduced  into  Brahmanism  during  this  period  was 
the  rite  of  Suttee,  or  the  voluntary  burning  of  the  widow  on  the  funeral  pyre  of 
her  husband. 


DYNASTIC    HISTORY.  13 

All  through  ancient  and  mediaeval  times  the  country  lay,  vague 
and  mysterious,  in  the  haze  of  the  world's  horizon.  During  the 
Middle  Ages  the  land  was  known  to  Europe  under  the  name  of 
Cathay. 

The  beginning  of  the  Chinese  nation  was  a  band  of  Turanian 
wanderers  who  came  into  the  basin  of  the  Yellow  River,  from  the 
West,  probably  prior  to  3000  B.C.  These  immigrants  gradually 
pushed  out  the  aborigines  whom  they  found  in  the  land,  and  laid 
the  basis  of  institutions  that  have  endured  to  the  present  day. 

Dynastic  History.  —  The  government  of  China  since  the  remot- 
est times  has  been  a  parental  monarchy.  The  Emperor  is  the 
father  of  his  people.  But  though  an  absolute  prince,  still  he  dare 
not  rule  tyrannically :  he  must  rule  justly,  and  in  accordance  with 
the  ancient  customs  and  laws. 

The  Chinese  have  books  that  purport  to  give  the  history  of  the 
different  dynasties  that  have  ruled  in  the  land  from  a  vast  antiquity  ; 
but  these  records  are  largely  mythical  and  legendary.  Everything 
is  confused  and  uncertain  until  we  reach  the  eighth  or  seventh 
century  before  our  era;  and  even  then  we  meet  with  little  of 
interest  in  the  dynastic  history  of  the  country  until  we  come  to 
the  reign  of  Che  Hwang-te  (246-210  B.C.).  This  energetic  ruler 
strengthened  and  consolidated  the  imperial  power,  and  executed 
great  works  of  internal  improvement,  such  as  roads  and  canals. 
As  a  barrier  against  the  incursions  of  the  Huns,  he  began  the 
erection  of  the  celebrated  Chinese  Wall,  a  great  rampartlTxfending 
for  about  1500  miles  along  the  northern  frontier  of  the  country.1 

From  the  strong  reign  of  Che  Hwang-te  to  the  end  of  the  period 

1  The  Great  Wall  is  one  of  the  most  remarkable  works  of  man.  "  It  is," 
says  Dr.  Williams,  "  the  only  artificial  structure  which  would  arrest  attention 
in  a  hasty  survey  of  the  globe."  It  has  been  estimated  that  there  is  more  than 
seventy  times  as  much  material  in  the  wall  as  there  is  in  the  Great  Pyramid 
of  Cheops,  and  that  it  represents  more  labor  than  100,000  miles  of  ordinary 
railroad.  It  was  begun  in  214  and  finished  in  204  H.c.  It  is  twenty-five  feet 
wide  at  base,  and  from  fifteen  to  thirty  feet  high.  Towers  forty  feet  high  rise 
at  irregular  intervals.  In  some  places  it  is  a  mere  earthen  rampart;  in  others 
it  is  faced  with  brick ;  and  then  again  it  is  composed  of  stone  throughout. 


14  INDIA  AND  CHINA. 

covered  by  ancient  history,  Chinese  dynastic  records  present  no 
matters  of  universal  interest  that  need  here  occupy  our  attention. 

Chinese  Writing. —  It  is  nearly  certain  that  the  art  of  writing 
wasjcnown  among  the  Chinese  as  early  as  2000  b.c.  The  system 
employed  is  curiously  cumbrous.  In  the  absence*  of  an  alphabet, 
each  word  of  the  language  is  represented  upon  the  written  page 
by  means  of  a  symbol,  or  combination  of  symbols  ;  this,  of  course, 
requires  that  there  be  as  many  symbols,  or  characters,  as  there 
are  words  in  the  language.  The  number  sanctioned  by  good  use 
is  about  25,000 ;  but  counting  obsolete  characters,  the  number 
amounts  to  over  50,000.  A  knowledge  of  5000  or  6000  char- 
acters, however,  enables  one  to  read  and  write  withoutdifficulty. 
The  task  of  learning  even  this  number  might  well  be  hopeless, 
were  it  not  that  many  of  the  characters  bear  a  remote  resemblance 
to  the  objects  for  which  they  stand,  and  when  once  explained, 
readily  suggest  the  thing  or  idea  represented.  The  nature  of  the 
characters  shows  conclusively  that  the  Chinese  system  of  writing, 
like  that  of  all  others  with  which  we  are  acquainted,  was  at  first 
purely  hieroglyphical,  that  is,  the  characters  were  originally  simply 
rude'outline  pictures  of  material  objects.  Time  and  use  have  worn 
them  to  their  present  form. 

This  Chinese  system  of  representing  thought,  cumbrous  and 
inconvenient  as  it  is,  is_  employed  at  the  present  time  by  one 
third  of  the  human  race. 

Printing  from  blocks  was  practised  in  China  as  early  as  the 
sixth  century  of  our  era,  and  printing  from  movable  types  as  early 
as  the  tenth  or  eleventh  century,  that  is  to  say,  about  four  hundred 
years  before  the  same  art  was  invented  in  Europe. 

Chinese  Literature  :  Confucius  and  Mencius.  — The  most  highly 
prized  portion  of  Chinese  literature  is  embraced  in  what  is  known 
as  the  Five  Classics  and  the  Four  Books,  called  collectively  the 
Nine  Classics.  The  Five  Classics  are  among  the  oldest  books  in 
the  world!  For  some  of  the  books  an  antiquity  of  3000  years  is 
claimed.  The  books  embrace  chronicles,  political  and  ethical 
maxims,  and  numerous  odes.     One  of  the  most  important  of  the 


INFLUENCE   OF  THE  SAGE   CONFUCIUS.  15 

Classics  is  the  so-called  Book  of  Rites,  said  to  date  from  1200 

B.C. 

The  Four  Books  are  of  later  origin  than  the  Five  Classics, 
having  been  written  about  the  fifth  and  fourth  centuries  before 
the  Christian  era;  yet  they  hardly  yield  to  them  in  sacredness 
in  the  eyes  of  the  Chinese.  The  first  three  of  the  series  are  by 
the  pupils  of  the  great  sage  and  moralist  Confucius  (551-478 
B.C.),  and  the  fourth  is  by  Mencius  (371-288  B.C.),  a  disciple 
of  Confucius,  and  a  scarcely  less  revered  philosopher  and  ethical 
teacher.  The  teachings  of  the  Four  Books  may  be  summed  up 
in  the  simple  precept,  "Walk  in  the  Trodden  Paths."  .  Confu^ 
cius  was  not  a  prophet,  or  revealer ;  he  laid  no  claims  to  a  super- 
natural knowledge  of  God  or  of  the  hereafter ;  he  said  nothing  of 
an  Infinite  Spirit,  and  but  little  of  a  future  life.  His  cardinal  pre- 
cepts were  obedience  to  superiors,  reverence  for  the  ancients,  and 
imitation  of  their  virtues.  He  himself  walked  in  the  old  paths, 
and  thus  added  the  force  of  example  to  that  of  precept.  He 
gave  the  Chinese  the  Golden  Rule,  stated  negatively :  "  What 
you  do  not  want  done  to  yourself,  do  not  do  to  others." 

During  the  reign  of  Che  Hwang- te  (see  p.  13),  Chinese  litera- 
ture suffered  a  great  disaster.  That  despot,  for  the  reason  that 
the  teachers  in  their  opposition  to  him  were  constantly  quoting 
the  ancient  writings  against  his  innovations,  ordered  the  chief 
historical  books  to  be  destroyed,  and  sentenced  to  death  any  one 
who  should  presume  to  talk  about  the  proscribed  writings,  or  even 
allude  to  the  virtues  of  the  ancients  in  such  a  way  as  to  reflect 
upon  his  reforms.  The  contumacious  he  sent  to  work  upon  the 
Great  Wall.  But  the  people  concealed  the  books  in  the  walls  of 
their  houses,  or  better  still  hid  them  away  in  their  memories;  and 
in  this  way  the  priceless  inheritance  of  antiquity  was  preserved 
until  the  storm  had  passed. 

Influence  of  this  Literature  and  of  the  Sage  Confucius.  —  It 
would  be  impossible  to  exaggerate  the  influence  which  the  Nine 
Classics  have  had  upon  the  Chinese  nation.  For  more  than  2000 
years  these  writings  have  been  the  Chinese  Bible.    And  as  all  of  the 


16  INDIA  AND  CHINA. 

Four  Books,  though  they  were  not  written  by  Confucius,  yet  bear 
the  impress  of  his  mind  and  thought,  just  as  the  Gospels  teach 
the  mind  of  Christ,  a  large  part  of  this  influence  must  be  attrib- 
uted to  the  life  and  teachings  of  that  great  Sage.  His  influence 
has  been  greater  than  that  of  any  other  teacher",  excepting  Christ 
and  perhaps  Buddha.  His  precepts,  implicitly  followed  by  his 
countrymen,  have  shaped  their  lives  from  his  day  to  the  present. 

The  moral  system  of  Confucius,  making,  as  it  does,  filial  obedi- 
ence and  a  conformity  to  ancient  customs  primary  virtues,  has 
exalted  the  family  life  among  the  Chinese  and  given  a  wonderful 
stability  to  Chinese  society.  Chinese  children  are  the  most  obedi- 
ent and  reverential  to  parents  of  any  children  in  the  world,  and 
the  Chinese  Empire  is  the  only  one  in  all  history  that  has  pro- 
longed its  existence  from  ancient  times  to  the  present. 

But  along  with  much  good,  one  great  evil  has  resulted  from  this 
blind,  servile  following  of  the  past.  The  Chinese  in  strictly 
obeying  the  injunction  to  walk  in  the  old  ways,  to  conform  to 
the  customs  of  the  ancients,  have  failed  to  mark  out  any  new 
footpaths  for  themselves.  Hence  their  lack  of  originality,  their 
habit  of  imitation :  hence  the  unchanging,  unprogressive  charac- 
ter of  Chinese  civilization. 

Education  and  Civil  Service  Competitive  Examinations.  — 
China  has  a  very  ancient  educational  system.  The  land  was  filled 
with  schools,  academies,  and  colleges  more  than  a  thousand  years 
before  our  era,  and  education  is  to-day  more  general  among  the 
Chinese  than  among  any  other  pagan  people.  A  knowledge  of 
the  sacred  books  is  the  sole  passport  to  civil  office  and  public 
employment.  All  candidates  for  places  in  the  government  must 
pass  a  competitive  examination  in  the  Nine  Classics.  This  system 
is  practically  the  same  in  principle  as  that  which  we,  with  great 
difficulty,  are  trying  to  establish  in  connection  with  our  own  civil 
service. 

The  Three  Religions,  —  Confucianism,  Taoism,  and  Buddhism. 
—  There  are  three  leading  religions  in  China,  —  Confucianism, 
Taoism,  and  Buddhism^    The  great  Sage  Confucius  is  reverenced 


POLICY  OF  NON-INTERCOURSE.  17 

and  worshipped  throughout  the  Empire.  He  holds  somewhat  the 
same  relation  to  the  system  that  bears  his  name  that  Christ  holds 
to  that  of  Christianity.  Taoism  takes  its  name  frojr^Tao^  which  is^ 
made,  hke^Brahma  in  Brahmanlsm,  the  beginning  of  all  things.  It 
is  a  very  curious  system  of  mystical  ideas  and  superstitious  prac- 
tices. Buddhism  was  introduced  into  China  about  the  opening  of 
the  Christian  era,  and  soon  became  widely  spread. 

There  is  one  element  common  to  all  these  religions,  and  that  is 
the  worship  of  ancestors.  Every  Chinese,  whether  he  be  a  Con- 
fucianist,  a  Taoist,  or  a  Buddhist,  reverences  his  ancestors,  and 
prays  and  makes  offerings  to  their  spirits. 

Policy  of  Non-Intercourse.  — The  Chinese  have  always  been  a 
very  self-satisfied  and  exclusive  people.  They  have  jealously 
excluded  foreigners  and  outside  influence  from  their  country.  The 
Great  Wall  with  which  they  have  hedged  in  their  country  on  the 
north,  is  the  symbol  of  their  policy  of  isolation.  Doubtless  this 
characteristic  of  the  Chinese  has  been  fostered  by  their  geographi- 
cal isolation ;  for  great  mountain  barriers  and  wide  deserts  cut  the 
country  off  from  communication  with  the  rest  of  the  Asiatic  con- 
tinent. And  then  their  reverence  for  antiquity  has  rendered  them 
intolerant  of  innovation  and  change.  Hence,  in  part,  the  unwil- 
lingness of  the  Chinese  to  admit  into  their  country  railroads,  tele- 
graphs, and  other  modern  improvements.  For  them  to  adopt  these 
new-fangled  inventions,  would  be  like  our  adopting  a  new  religion. 
Such  a  departure  from  the  ways  and  customs  of  the  past  has  in  it, 
to  their  way  of  thinking,  something  akin  to  disrespect  and  irrev- 
erence for  ancestors. 


18  EGYPT. 


CHAPTER  II. 

EGYPT, 
i.  Political  History. 

Egypt  and  the  Nile.  —  Egypt  comprises  the  delta  of  the  Nile 
and  the  flood-plains  of  its  lower  course.  The  whole  land  is 
formed  of  the  deposits  of  the  river ;  hence  Herodotus,  in  happy 
phrase,  called  the  country  "the  gift  of  the  Nile."  The  delta 
country  was  known  to  the  ancients  as  Lower  Egypt;  while  the 
valley  proper,  reaching  from  the  head  of  the  delta  to  the  First 
Cataract,  a  distance  of  six  hundred  miles,  was  called  Upper 
Egypt.1 

Through  the  same  means  by  which  Egypt  was  originally  created, 
is  the  land  each  year  still  renewed  and  fertilized.  The  Nile, 
swollen  by  the  heavy  tropical  rains  about  its  sources,  begins  to 
rise  in  its  lower  parts  late  in  June,  and  by  October,  when  the 
inundation  has  attained  its  greatest  height,  the  country  presents 
the  appearance  of  an  inland  sea. 

By  the  end  of  November  the  river  has  returned  to  its  bed,  and 
the  fields,  over  which  has  been  spread  a  film  of  rich  earth,2  present 
the  appearance  of  black  mud-flats.  Usually  the  plow  is  run 
lightly  over  the  soft  surface,  but  in  some  cases  the  grain  is  sown 
upon  the  undisturbed  deposit,  and  simply  trampled  in  by  flocks  of 

1  About  seven  hundred  miles  from  the  Mediterranean  a  low  ledge  of  rocks, 
stretching  across  the  Nile,  forms  the  first  obstruction  to  navigation  in  passing 
up  the  river.  The  rapids  found  at  this  point  are  termed  the  First  Cataract. 
Six  other  cataracts  occur  in  the  next  seven  hundred  miles  of  the  river's  course. 

2  The  rate  of  the  fluviatile  deposit  is  from  three  to  five  inches  in  a  century. 
The  surface  of  the  valley  at  Thebes,  as  shown  by  the  accumulations  about  the 
monuments,  has  been  raised  seven  feet  during  the  last  seventeen  hundred  years. 


ALEXANDRIA 


ANCIENT 

EGYPT 


Second  Cataract 


4  CO.,  lU^ALO,  H.T. 


CLIMA  TE.  19 

sheep  and  goats  driven  over  it.  In  a  few  weeks  the  entire  land, 
so  recently  a  flooded  plain,  is  overspread  with  a  sea  of  verdure, 
which  forms  a  striking  contrast  to  the  desert  sands  and  barren 
hills  that  rim  the  valley. 

Climate.  —  In  Lower  Egypt,  near  the  sea,  the  rainfall  in  the 
winter  is  abundant  j  but  the  climate  of  Upper  Egypt  is  all  but 
rainless,  only  a  few  slight  showers  falling  throughout  the  year. 
This  dryness  of  the  Egyptian  air  is  what  has  preserved  through  so 
many  thousand  years,  in  such  wonderful  freshness  of  color  and 
with  such  sharpness  of  outline,  the  numerous  paintings  and  sculp- 
tures of  the  monuments  of  the  Pharaohs. 

The  southern  line  of  Egypt  only  just  touches  the  tropics ;  still 
the  climate,  influenced  by  the  wide  and  hot  deserts  that  hem  the 
valley,  is  semi-tropical  in  character.  The  fruits  of  the  tropics  and 
the  cereals  of  the  temperate  zone  grow  luxuriantly.  Thus  favored 
in  climate  as  well  as  in  the  matter  of  irrigation,  Egypt  became  in 
early  times  the  granary  of  the  East.  To  it  less  favored  countries, 
when  stricken  by  famine,  —  a  calamity  so  common  in  the  East  in 
regions  dependent  upon  the  rainfall,  —  looked  for  food,  as  did  the 
families  of  Israel  during  drought  and  failure  of  crops  in  Pales- 
tine. 

Dynasties  and  Chronology.  —  The  kings,  or  Pharaohs,  that 
reigned  in  Egypt  from  the  earliest  times  till  the  conquest  of  the 
country  by  Alexander  the  Great  (332  B.C.),  are  grouped  into  thirty- 
one  dynasties.  Thirty  of  these  we  find  in  the  lists  of  Manetho,  an 
;  >tian  priest  who  lived  in  the  third  century  B.C.,  and  who  com- 
piled a  chronicle  of  the  kings  of  the  country  from  the  manuscripts 
kept  in  the  Egyptian  temples. 

We  cannot  assign  a  positive  date  to  the  beginning  of  the  First 
Dynasty,  chiefly  because  Egyptologists  are  at  a  loss  to  know 
whether  to  consider  all  the  dynasties  of  Manetho's  list  as  succes- 
sive or  in  part  contemporaneous.  Thus,  it  is  held  by  some 
scholars  that  several  of  these  families  were  reigning  at  the  same 
time  in  the  different  cities  of  Upper  and  Lower  Egypt ;  while  others 
think  that  they  all  reigned  at  different  epochs,  and  that  the  sum 


20  EGYPT. 

of  the  lengths  of  the  several  dynasties  gives  us  the  true  date  of 
the  beginning  of  the  political  history  of  the  country.  Accordingly, 
somejplace  tne  beginning  of  the  First  Dynasty  at  about  5000B.C., 
while  others  put  it  at  about  3000B.C.  The  constantly  growing 
evidence  of  the  monuments  is  in  favor  of  the  higher  figures. 

Menes,  the  First  of  the  Pharaohs.  —  Menes  is  the  first  kingly 
personage,  shadowy  and  indistinct  in  form,  that  we  discover  in  the 
early  dawn  of  Egyptian  history.  Tradition  makes  him  the  founder 
of  Memphis,  near  the  head  of  the  Delta,  the  site  of  which  capital 
he  secured  against  the  inundations  of  the  Nile  by  vast  dikes  and 
various  engineering  works.  To  him  is  ascribed  the  achievement 
of  first  consolidating  the  numerous  petty  principalities  of  Lower 
Egypt  into  a  single  state. 

The  Fourth  Dynasty :  the  Pyramid  Kings  (about  2  700  b.c.)  .  — 
The  kings  of  the  Fourth  Dynasty,  who  reigned  at  Memphis,  are 
called  the  Pyramid  builders.  Kufu  I.,  the  Cheops  of  the  Greeks, 
was  the  first  great  builder.  To  him  we  can  now  positively  ascribe 
the  building  of  the  Great  Pyramid,  the  largest  of  the  Gizeh  group, 
near  Cairo  ;  for  his  name  has  been  found  upon  some  of  the  stones, 
—  painted  on  them  by  his  workmen  before  the  blocks  were  taken 
from  the  quarries. 

The  mountains  of  stone  heaped  together  by  the  Pyramid  kings 
are  proof  that  they  were  cruel  oppressors  of  their  people,  and  bur- 
dened them  with  useless  labor  upon  these  monuments  of  their 
ambition.  Tradition  tells  how  the  very  memory  of  these  mon- 
archs  was  hated  by  the  people.  Herodotus  says  that  the  Egyp- 
tians did  not  like  even  to  speak  the  names  of  the  builders  of  the 
two  largest  pyramids. 

The  Twelfth  Dynasty  (about  2300  b.c).  —  After  the  Sixth 
Dynasty,  Egypt,  for  several  centuries,  is  almost  lost  from  view. 
When  finally  the  valley  emerges  from  the  obscurity  of  this  period, 
the  old  capital  Memphis  has  receded  into  the  background,  and 
the  city  of  Thebes  has  taken  its  place  as  the  seat  of  the  royal  power. 

The  period  of  the  Twelfth  Dynasty,  a  line  of  Theban  kings,  is 
one  of  the  brightest  in  Egyptian  history.     Many  monuments  scat- 


THE  HYKSOS,    OR  SHEPHERD  KINGS.  21 

tered  throughout  the  country  perpetuate  the  fame  of  the  sovereigns 
of  this  illustrious  house.  Egyptian  civilization  is  regarded  by 
many  as  having  during  this  period  reached  the  highest  perfection 
to  which  it  ever  attained. 

The  Hyksos,  or  Shepherd  Kings  (from  about  2100  to  1650  b.c). 
—  Soon  after  the  bright  period  of  the  Twelfth  Dynasty,  Egypt 
again  suffered  a  great  eclipse.  Nomadic  tribes  from  Syria  crossed 
the  eastern  frontier  of  Egypt,  took  possession  of  the  inviting  pas- 
ture-lands of  the  Delta,  and  established  there  the  empire  of  the 
Shepherd  Kings. 

These  Asiatic  intruders  were  violent  and  barbarous,  and  de- 
stroyed or  mutilated  the  monuments  of  the  country.  But  grad- 
ually they  were  transformed  by  the  civilization  with  which  they 
were  in  contact,  and  in  time  they  adopted  the  manners  and  cul- 
ture of  the  Egyptians.  It  was  probably  during  the  supremacy  of 
the  Hyksos  that  the  families  of  Israel  found  a  refuge  in  Lower 
j  >t.  They  received^jdndreception  from  the  ShepherdjCingSj 
not  only  because  they  had  the  same_pastoral  habits,  but  also^ 
probably,  because  of  near  kinship  in  race. 

At  last  these  intruders,  after  TEeyTiad  ruled  in  the  valley  four  or 
five  hundred  years,  were  expelled  by  the  Theban  kings,  and  driven 
back  into  Asia.  This  occurred  about  1650  b.c.  The  episode  ot 
the  Shepherd  Kings  in  Egypt  derives  great  importance  from  the 
fact  that  these  Asiatic  conquerors  were  one  of  the  mediums 
through  which  Egyptian  civilization  was  transmitted  to  the  Phoeni- 
cians, who,  through  their  wide  commercial  relations,  spread  the 
same  among  all  the  early  nations  of  the  Mediterranean  area. 

And  further,  the  Hyksos  conquest  was  an  advantage  to  Egypt 
itself.  The  conquerors  possessed  political  capacity,  and  gave  the 
country  a  strong  centralized  government.  They  made  Egypt  in 
fact  a  great  monarchy,  and  laid  the  basis  of  the  power  and  glory 
of  the  mighty  Pharaohs  of  the  Eighteenth  and  Nineteenth  Dy- 
nasties. 

The  Eighteenth  Dynasty  (about  1650-1400  b.c.).  — The  revolt 
which  drove  the  Hyksos  from  the  country  was  led  by  Amosis,  or 


11 


EGYPT. 


Ahmes,  a  descendant  of  the  Theban  kings.  He  was  the  first  king 
of  what  is  known  as  the  Eighteenth  Dynasty,  probably  the  greatest 
race  of  kings,  it  has  been  said,  that  ever  reigned  upon  the  earth. 

The  most  eventful  period  of  Egyptian  history,  covered  by  what 
is  called  the  New  Empire,  now  opens.  Architecture  and  learning 
seem  to  have  recovered  at  a  bound  from  their  long  depression 
under  the  domination  of  the  Shepherd  Kings.  To  free  his  empire 
from  the  danger  of  another  invasion  from  Asia,  Amosis  deter- 
mined to  subdue  the  Syrian  and  Mesopotamian  tribes.  This  for- 
eign policy,  followed  out  by  his  successors,  shaped  many  of  the 
events  of  their  reigns. 

Thothmes  III.,  one  of  the  greatest  kings  of  this  Eighteenth 
Dynasty,  has  been  called  "  the  Alexander  of  Egyptian  history." 

During  his  reign  the  frontiers  of  the 
empire  reached  their  greatest  expan- 
sion. His  authority  extended  from 
the  oases  of  the  Libyan  desert  to  the 
Tigris  and  the  Euphrates. 

Thothmes  was  also  a  magnificent 
builder.  His  architectural  works  in 
the  valley  of  the  Nile  were  almost 
numberless.  He  built  a  great  part 
of  the  temple  of  Karnak,  at  Thebes, 
the  remains  of  which  form  the  most 
majestic  ruin  in  the  world.  His  ob- 
elisks stand  to-day  in  Constantino- 
ple, in  Rome,  in  London,  and  in 
New  York. 

The  name  of  Amunoph  III.  stands 
next  after  that  of  Thothmes  III.  as 
one  of  the  great  rulers  and  builders  of  the  Eighteenth  Dynasty. 
The  Nineteenth  Dynasty  (about  1400-1280  b.c).  —  The  Pha- 
raohs of  the  Nineteenth  Dynasty  rival  those  of  the  Eighteenth  in 
their  fame  as  conquerors  and  builders.  It  is  their  deeds  and 
works,  in  connection  with  those  of  the  preceding  dynasty,  that 


PHALANX  OF  THE  KHITA: 

In  the  background,  town  protected  by 
walls  and  moats. 


THE  NINETEENTH  DYNASTY.  23 

have  given  Egypt  such  a  name  and  place  in  history.     The_two_ 
jrreat  names  of  the  house  are  Seti  I.  and  Rameses  II. 

One  of  the  most  important  of  Seti's  wars  was  that  against  the 
Hittites  {Khita,  in  the  inscriptions)  and  their  allies.  The  Hittites 
were  a  powerful  non-Semitic  people,  whose  capital  was  Carche- 
mish,  on  the  Euphrates,  and  whose  strength  and  influence  were  now 
so  great  as  to  be  a  threat  to  Egypt. 

But  Seti's  deeds  as  a  warrior  are  eclipsed  by  his  achievements 
as  a  builder.  He  constructed  the  main  part  of  what  is  perhaps 
the  most  impressive  edifice  ever  raised  by  man,  —  the  world- 
renowned  "  Hall  of  Columns,"  in  the  Temple  of  Karnak,  at  Thebes 
(see  illustration,  p.  32).  He  also  cut 
for  himself  in  the  Valley  of  the  Tombs  of 
the  Kings,  at  the  same  place,  the  most 
beautiful  and  elaborate  of  all  the  rock- 
sepulchres  of  the  Pharaohs  (see  p.  31).  In 
addition  to  these  and  numerous  other 
works,  he  began  a  canal  to  unite  the  Red 
Sea  and  the  Nile, — an  undertaking  which 
was  completed  by  his  son  and  successor, 
Rameses  II. 

Rameses  II.,  sumamed  the  Great,  was 
the  Sesostris  of  the  Greeks.     His  is  the  seti  i.    (From  a  photograph  of 
most  prominent  name  of  the  Nineteenth  e  mummy) 

I  )\  nasty.  Ancient  writers,  in  fact,  accorded  him  the  first  place 
among  all  the  Egyptian  sovereigns,  and  made  him  the  hero  of 
innumerable  stories.  His  long  reign,  embracing  sixty-seven  years, 
was,  in  truth,  well  occupied  with  military  expeditions  and  the 
superintendence  of  great  architectural  works. 

His  chief  wars  were  those  against  the  Hittites.  Time  and  again 
is  Rameses  found  with  his  host  of  war-chariots  in  their  country, 
but  he  evidently  fails  to  break  their  power;  for  we  find  him  at 
last  concluding  with  them  a  celebrated  treaty,  in  which  the  chief 
of  the  Hittites  is  called  "The  Great  King  of  the  Khita"  (Hit- 
tites), and  is  formally  recognized  as  in  every  respect  the  equal  of 


2-1 


EGYPT. 


the  king  of  Egypt.  Later,  Rameses  marries  a  daughter  of  the 
Hittite  king.  All  this  means  that  the  Pharaohs  had  met  their 
peers  in  the  princes  of  the  Hittites,  and  that  they  could  no  longer 
hope  to  become  masters  of  Western  Asia. 

It  was  probably  the  fear  of  an  invasion  by  the  tribes  of  Syria 
that  led  Rameses  to  reduce  to  a  position  of  grinding  servitude  the 
Semitic  peoples  that  under  former  dynasties  had  been  permitted 
to  settle  in  Lower  Egypt;  for  this  Nineteenth  Dynasty,  to  which 
Rameses  II.  belongs,  was  the  new  king  (dynasty)  thaf  arose 
" which  knew  not  Joseph"  (Ex.  i.  8),  and  oppressed  the  chifdren 


RAMESES  II.  RETURNING  IN  TRIUMPH   FROM  SYRIA,  with  his  chariot  garnished 
with  the  heads  of  his  enemies.     (From  the  monuments  of  Karnak.) 


of  Israel.  It  was  during  the  reign  of  his  son  Menephtha  that  the 
Exodus  took  place  (about  1300  b.c). 

The  Twenty-sixth  Dynasty (666-5 2 7  b.c).  —  We  pass  without 
comment  a  long  period  of  several  centuries,  marked,  indeed,  by 
great  vicissitudes  in  the  fortunes  of  the  Egyptian  monarchs,  yet 
characterized  throughout  by  a  sure  and  rapid  decline  in  the  power 
and  splendor  of  their  empire. 

During  the  latter  part  of  this  period  Egypt  was  tributary  to  As- 
syria. But  about  666  b.c,  a  native  prince,  Psammetichus  I.  (666- 
612  b.c),  with  the  aid  of  Greek  mercenaries  from  Asia  Minor, 


THE    TWENTY-SIXTH  DYNASTY.  25 

succeeded  in  expelling  the  Assyrian  garrisons.  Psammetichus 
thus  became  the  founder  of  the  Twenty-sixth  Dynasty. 

The  reign  of  this  monarch  marks  a  new  era  in  Egyptian  history. 
Hitherto  Egypt  had  secluded  herself  from  the  world,  behind  bar- 
riers of  jealousy,  race,  and  pride.  But  Psammetichus  being  him- 
self, it  seems,  of  non- Egyptian  origin,  and  owing  his  throne  chiefly 
to  the  swords  of  Greek  soldiers,  was  led  to  reverse  the  policy  of 
the  past,  and  to  throw  the  valley  open  to  the  commerce  and  in- 
fluences of  the  world.  His  capital,  Sai's,  on  the  Canopic  branch 
of  the  Nile,  forty  miles  from  the  Mediterranean,  was  filled  with 
Greek  citizens ;  and  Greek  mercenaries  were  employed  in  his 
armies. 

This  change  of  policy,  occurring  at  just  the  period  when  the 
rising  states  of  Greece  and  Rome  were  shaping  their  institutions, 
was  a  most  significant  event.  Egypt  became  the  University  of  the 
Mediterranean  nations.  From  this  time  forward  Greek  philoso- 
phers, as  in  the  case  of  Pythagoras  and  of  Plato,  are  represented 
as  becoming  pupils  of  the  Egyptian  priests  ;  and  without  question 
the  learning  and  philosophy  of  the  ancient  Egyptians  exerted  a 
profound  influence  upon  the  quick,  susceptible  mind  of  the  Hel- 
lenic race,  that  was,  in  its  turn,  to  become  the  teacher  of  the 
world. 

The  liberal  policy  of  Psammetichus,  while  resulting  in  a  great  ad- 
vantage to  foreign  nations,  brought  a  heavy  misfortune  upon  his 
own.  Displeased  with  the  position  assigned  Greek  mercenaries  in 
the  army,  the  native  Egyptian  soldiers  revolted,  and  two  hundred 
thousand  of  the  troops  seceding  in  a  body,  emigrated  to  Ethiopia, 
whence  no  inducement  that  Psammetichus  offered  could  persuade 
them  to  return. 

The  son  of  Psammetichus,  Necho  II.  (612-596  B.C.),  the 
Pharaoh-Necho  of  the  Bible,  followed  the  liberal  policy  marked 
out  by  his  father.  To  facilitate  commerce,  he  attempted  to  re- 
open the  old  canal  dug  by  Seti  I.  and  his  son,  which  had  become 
unnavigable.  After  the  loss  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand 
workmen  in  the  prosecution  of  the  undertaking,  Necho  was  con- 


26  EGYPT. 

strained  to  abandon  it ;  Herodotus  says,  on  account  of  an  unfa- 
vorable oracle. 

Necho  then  fitted  out  an  exploring  expedition  for  the  circum- 
navigation of  Africa,  in  hope  of  finding  a  possible  passage  for  his 
fleets  from  the  Red  Sea  to  the  Nile  by  a  water  channel  already 
opened  by  nature,  and  to  which  the  priests  and  oracles  could 
interpose  no  objections.  The  expedition,  we  have  reason  to  be- 
lieve, actually  accomplished  the  feat  of  sailing  around  the  conti- 
nent ;  for  Herodotus,  in  his  account  of  the  enterprise,  says  that 
the  voyagers  upon  their  return  reported  that,  when  they  were 
rounding  the  cape,  the  sun  was  on  their  right  hand  (to  the  north). 
This  feature  of  the  report,  which  led  Herodotus  to  disbelieve  it, 
is  to  us  the  very  strongest  evidence  possible  that  the  voyage  was 
really  performed. 

The  Last  of  the  Pharaohs.  —  Before  the  close  of  his  reign, 
Necho  had  come  into  collision  with  the  king  of  Babylon,  and  was 
forced  to  acknowledge  his  supremacy.  A  little  later,  Babylon  hav- 
ing yielded  to  the  rising  power  of  Persia,  Egypt  also  passed  under 
Persian  authority  (see  p.  77).  The  Egyptians,  however,  were 
restive  under  this  foreign  yoke,  and,  after  a  little  more  than  a  cen- 
tury, succeeded  in  throwing  it  off;  but  the_country  was  again_suh- 
jugated  by  the  Persian  king  Artaxerxes  HI.  (about  340  B.C.),  and 
from  that  time  until  our  own  day  no  native  prince  has  ever_§at 
uponJthe_dn^oneot  theTharaohs^  Xong  before  the  Persian  con- 
quest, the  Prophet  Ezekiel,  foretelling  the  debasement  of  Egypt,  had 
declared,  "  There  shall  be  no  more  a  prince  of  the  land  of  Egypt."  \ 

Upon  the  extension  of  the  power  of  the  Macedonians  over  the 
East  ($$2)  B-c)>  Egypt  willingly  exchanged  masters  ;  and  for  three 
centuries  the  valley  was  the  seat  of  the  renowned  Grseco-Egyptian 
Empire  of  the  Ptolemies,  which  lasted  until  the  Romans  annexed 
the  region  to  their  all-absorbing  empire  (30  B.C.). 

"  The  mission  of  Egypt  among  the  nations  was  fulfilled ;  it  had 
lit  the  torch  of  civilization  in  ages  inconceivably  remote,  and  had 
passed  it  on  to  other  peoples  of  the  West." 

1  Ezek.  xxx.  13. 


CLASSES   OF  SOCIETY.  27 


2.   Religion,  Arts,  and  General  Culture. 

Classes  of  Society.  —  Egyptian  society  was  divided  into  three 
great  classes,  or  orders,  —  priests,  soldiers,  and  common  people ; 
the  last  embracing  shepherds,  husbandmen,  and  artisans. 

The  sacerdotal  order  consisted  of  high-priests,  prophets,  scribes, 
keepers  of  the  sacred  robes  and  animals,  sacred  sculptors,  masons, 
and  embalmers.  They  enjoyed  freedom  from  taxation,  and  met 
the  expenses  of  the  temple  services  with  the  income  of  the  sacred 
lands,  which  embraced  one  third  of  the  soil  of  the  country. 

The  priests  were  extremely  scrupulous  in  the  care  of  their  per- 
sons. They  bathed  twice  by  day  and  twice  by  night,  and  shaved 
the  entire  body  every  third  day.  Their  inner  clothing  was  linen, 
woollen  garments  being  thought  unclean ;  their  diet  was  plain  and 
even  abstemious,  in  order  that,  as  Plutarch  says,  "  their  bodies 
might  sit  light  as  possible  about  their  souls." 

Next  to  the  priesthood  in  rank  and.  honor  stood  the  military 
order.  Like  the  priests,  the  soldiers  formed  a  landed  class.  They 
held  one  third  of  the  soil  of  Egypt.  To  each  soldier  was  given 
a  tract  of  about  eight  acres,  exempt  from  all  taxes.  They  were 
carefully  trained  in  their  profession,  and  there  was  no  more  effec- 
tive soldiery  in  ancient  times  than  that  which  marched  beneath 
the  standard  of  the  Pharaohs. 

The  Chief  Deities. — Attached  to  the  chief  temples  of  the 
Egyptians  were  colleges  for  the  training  of  the  sacerdotal  order. 
These  institutions  were  the  repositories  of  the  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptians.     This  learning  was  open  only  to  the  initiated  few. 

The  unity  of  God  was  the  central  doctrine  in  this  private  sys- 
tem. They  gave  to  this  Supreme  Being  the  very  same  name  by 
which  he  was  known  to  the  Hebrews  —  Nuk  Pu  Nuk,  "  I  am  that 
I  am."  l     The  sacred  manuscripts  say,  "  He  is  the  one  living  and 

1  "  It  is  evident  what  a  new  light  this  discovery  throws  on  the  sublime 
passage  in  Exodus  iii.  14;  where  Moses,  whom  we  may  suppose  to  have 
been  initiated  into  this  formula,  is  sent  both  to  his  people  and  to  Pharaoh  to 
proclaim  the  true  God  by  this  very  title,  and  to  declare  that  the  God  of  the 


28  EGYPT. 

true  God,  .  .  .  who  has  made  all  things,  and  was  not  himself 
made." 

The  Egyptian  divinities  of  the  popular  mythology  were  fre- 
quently grouped  in  triads.  First  in  importance  among  these  groups 
was  that  formed  by  Osiris,  Isis  (his  wife  and  sister),  and  Horus, 
their  son.  The  members  of  this  triad  were  worshipped  through- 
out Egypt. 

The  god  Set  (called  Typhon  by  the  Greek  writers),  the  prin- 
ciple of  evil,  was  the  Satan  of  Egyptian  mythology.  While  the 
good  and  beneficent  Osiris  was  symbolized  by  the  life-giving  Nile, 
the  malignant  Typhon  was  emblemized  by  the  terrors  and  barren- 
ness of  the  desert. 


MUMMY  OF  A  SACRED   BULL.      (From  a  photograph.) 

Animal -Worship. — The  Egyptians  regarded  certain  animals 
as  emblems  of  the  gods,  and  hence  worshipped  them.  To  kill 
one  of  these  sacred  animals  was  adjudged  the  greatest  impiety. 
Persons  so  unfortunate  as  to  harm  one  through  accident  were 
sometimes  murdered  by  the  infuriated  people.  The  destruction 
of  a  cat  in  a  burning  building  was  lamented  more  than  the  loss 

highest  Egyptian  theology  was  also  the  God  of  Abraham,  of  Isaac,  and  of 
Jacob.  The  case  is  parallel  to  that  of  Paul  at  Athens."  —  Smith's  Ancient 
History  of  the  East,  p.  196,  note. 


ANIMAL-WORSHIP.  29 

of  the  property.  Upon  the  death  of  a  dog,  every  member  of  the 
family  shaved  his  head.  The  scarabaeus,  or  beetle,  was  especially 
sacred,  being  considered  an  emblem  of  the  sun,  or  of  life. 

Not  only  were  various  animals  held  sacred,  as  being  the  emblems 
of  certain  deities,  but  some  were  thought  to  be  real  gods.  Thus 
the  soul  of  Osiris,  it  was  imagined,  animated  the  body  of  some 
bull,  which  might  be  known  from  certain  spots  and  markings. 

Upon  the  death  of  the  sacred  bull,  or  Apis,  as  he  was  called, 
a  great  search,  accompanied  with  loud  lamentation,  was  made 
throughout  the  land  for  his  successor :  for,  the  moment  the  soul  of 
Osiris  departed  from  the  dying  bull,  it  entered  a  calf  that  moment 
born.  The  calf  was  always  found  with  the  proper  markings ;  but,  as 
Wilkinson  says,  the  young  animal  had  probably  been  put  to  "  much 
inconvenience  and  pain  to  make  the  marks  and  hair  conform  to 
his  description." 

The  body  of  the  deceased  Apis  was  carefully  embalmed,  and, 
amid  funeral  ceremonies  of  great  expense  and  magnificence, 
deposited  in  the  tomb  of  his  predecessors.  In  185 1,  Mariette 
discovered  this  sepulchral  chamber  of  the  sacred  bulls.  It  is  a 
narrow  gallery,  two  thousand  feet  in  length,  cut  in  the  limestone 
cliffs  just  opposite  the  site  of  ancient  Memphis.  A  large  num- 
ber of  the  immense  granite  coffins,  fifteen  feet  long  and  eight 
wide  and  high,  have  been  brought  to  light. 

Many  explanations  have  been  given  to  account  for  the  existence 
of  such  a  debased  form  of  worship  among  so  cultured  a  people  as 
were  the  ancient  Egyptians.  Probably  the  sacred  animals  in  the 
later  worship  represent  an  earlier  stage  of  the  Egyptian  religion, 
just  as  many  superstitious  beliefs  and  observances  among  ourselves 
are  simply  survivals  from  earlier  and  ruder  times. 

Judgment  of  the  Dead.  —  Death  was  a  great  equalizer  among 
the  Egyptians.  King  and  peasant  alike  must  stand  before  the 
judgment-seat  of  Osiris  and  his  forty-two  assessors. 

This  judgment  of  the  soul  in  the  other  world  was  prefigured  by 
a  peculiar  ordeal  to  which  the  body  was  subjected  here.  Between 
each  chief  city  and  the  burial-place  on  the  western  edge  of  the 


30 


EGYPT. 


valley  was  a  sacred  lake,  across  which  the  body  was  borne  in  a 
barge.  But,  before  admittance  to  the  boat,  it  must  pass  the 
ordeal  called  "  the  judgment  of  the  dead."  This  was  a  trial  before 
a  tribunal  of  forty-two  judges,  assembled  upon  the  shore  of  the 
lake.  Any  person  could  bring  accusations  against  the  deceased, 
false  charges  being  guarded  against  by  the  most  dreadful  penalties. 
If  it  appeared  that  the  life  of  the  deceased  had  been  evil,  passage 
to  the  boat  was  denied ;  and  the  body  was  either  carried  home  in 
dishonor,  or,  in  case  of  the  poor  who  could  not  afford  to  care  for 
the  mummy,  was  interred  on  the  shores  of  the  lake.  Many  mum- 
mies of  those  refused  admission  to  the  tombs  of  their  fathers  have 
been  dug  up  along  these  "  Stygian  banks." 


JUDGMENT  OF  THE  DEAD:   above,  an  ape-assessor  scourges  an  evil  soul, 
that  has  been  changed  into  an  unclean  animal. 


But  this  ordeal  of  the  body  was  only  a  faint  symbol  of  the  dread 
tribunal  of  Osiris  before  which  the  soul  must  appear  in  the  lower 
world.  In  one  scale  of  a  balance  was  placed  the  heart  of  the 
deceased  ;  in  the  other  scale,  an  image  of  Justice,  or  Truth.  The 
soul  stands  by  watching  the  result,  and,  as  the  beam  inclines,  is 
either  welcomed  to  the  companionship  of  the  good  Osiris,  or 
consigned  to  oblivion  in  the  jaws  of  a  frightful  hippopotamus- 
headed  monster,  "  the  devourer  of  evil  souls."  This  annihilation, 
however,  is  only  the  fate  of  those  inveterately  wicked.  Those 
respecting  whom  hopes  of  reformation  may  be  entertained  are 


TOMBS. 


M 


condemned  to  return  to  earth  and  do  penance  in  long  cycles  of 
lives  in  the  bodies  of  various  animals.  This  is  what  is  known  as 
the  transmigration  of  souls.  The  kind  of  animals  the  soul  should 
animate,  and  the  length  of  its  transmigrations,  were  determined  by 
the  nature  of  its  sins. 

Tombs.  —  The  Egyptians  bestowed  little  care  upon  the  tem- 
porary residences  of  the  living,  but  the  "  eternal  homes  "  of  the 
dead  were  fitted  up  with  the  most  lavish  expenditure  of  labor. 
These  were  chambers,  sometimes  built  of  brick  or  stone,  but  more 
usually  cut  in  the  limestone  cliffs  that  form  the  western  rim  of  the 
Nile  valley ;  for  that,  as  the  land  of  the  sunset,  was  conceived  to 
be  the  realm  of  darkness  and  of  death.  The  cliffs  opposite  the 
ancient  Egyptian  capitals  are  honeycombed  with  sepulchral 
cells. 


BRICK-MAKING  IN  ANCIENT  EGYPT,   (From  Thebes.) 


In  the  hills  back  of  Thebes  is  the  so-called  Valley  of  the  Tombs 
of  the  Kings,  the  "Westminster  Abbey  of  Egypt."  Here  are 
twenty-five  magnificent  sepulchres.  These  consist  of  extensive 
rock-cut  passages  and  chambers  richly  sculptured  and  painted. 

The  subjects  of  the  decorations  of  many  of  the  tombs,  particu- 
larly of  the  oldest,  are  drawn  from  the  life  and  manners  of  the 
times.  Thus  the  artist  has  converted  for  us  the  Egyptian  necrop- 
olis into  a  city  of  the  living,  where  the  Egypt  of  four  thousand 
years  ago  seems  to  pass  before  our  eyes. 

The  Pyramid*.  —  The  Egyptian  pyramids,  the  tombs  of  the 
earlier  Pharaohs,  are  the  most  venerable  monuments  that  have 
been  preserved  to  us  from  the  early  world.  They  were  almost 
all  erected  before  the  Twelfth  Dynasty.     Although  thus  standing 


32 


EGYPT. 


away  back  in  the  earliest  twilight  of  the  historic  morning,  never- 
theless they  mark,  not  the  beginning,  but  the  perfection  of  Egyp- 
tian art.  They  speak  of  long  periods  of  growth  in  art  and  science 
lying  beyond  the  era  they  represent.  It  is  this  vast  ard  myste- 
rious background 
that  astonishes  us 
even  more  than 
these  giant  forms 
cast  up  against  it. 

Being  sepulchral 
monuments,  the 
pyramids  are  con- 
fined to  the  western 
side  of  the  Nile 
valley  (see  p.  31). 
There  are  over 
thirty  still  standing, 
with  traces  of  about 
forty  more. 

The  Pyramid  of 
Cheops,  the  largest 
of  the  Gizeh  group, 
near  Cairo,  rises 
from  a  base  cov- 
ering thirteen 
acres,  to  a  height 
of  four  hundred 
and  f  i  f  t  y  f e  e  t . 
According  to  He- 
rodotus, Cheops 
employed  one  hun- 
dred  thousand   men   for   twenty   years   in   its   erection. 

Palaces  and  Temples.  —  The  earlier  Memphian  kings  built 
great  unadorned  pyramids,  but  the  later  Theban  monarchs  con- 
structed splendid  palaces  and  temples.     Two  of  the  most  promi- 


THE   GREAT    HALL  OF   COLUMNS    AT    KARNAK. 


PALACES  AND    TEMPLES. 


33 


nent  masses  of  buildings  on  the  site  of  Thebes  are  called,  the  one 
the  Palace  of  Karnak,  and  the  other  the  Temple  of  Luxor,  from 
the  names  of  two  native  villages  built  near  or  within  the  ruined 
enclosures.  The  former  was  more  than  five  hundred  years  in 
building.  As  an  adjunct  of  the  Palace  at  Karnak  was  a  Hall 
of  Columns,  which  consisted  of  a  phalanx  of  one  hundred  and 
sixty-four  gigan- 
tic pillars.  Some 
of  these  columns 
measure  over 
seventy  feet  in 
height,  with  capi- 
tals sixty-five  feet 
in  circumference. 

In  Nubia,  be- 
yond the  First 
Cataract,  is  the 
renowned  rock- 
hewn  temple  of 
Ipsambul,  the 
front  of  which  is 
adorned  with  four 
gigantic  portrait- 
statues  of  Rame- 
ses  II.,  seventy 
feet    in    height. 

This   temple   has    been   pronounced  the   greatest   and   grandest 
achievement  of  Egyptian  art. 

Sculpture  :  Sphinxes  and  Colossi.  — A  strange  immobility,  due 
to  the  influence  of  religion,  attached  itself,  at  an  early  period,  to 
Egyptian  art.  The  artist,  in  the  portrayal  of  the  figures  of  the 
gods,  was  not  allowed  to  change  a  single  line  in  the  conventional 
form.  Hence  the  impossibility  of  improvement  in  sacred  sculp- 
ture. Wilkinson  says  that  Menes  would  have  recognized  the 
statue  of  Osiris  in  the  Temple  of  Amasis.     Plato  complained  that 


STATUES  OF  MEMNON    AT  THEBES. 


34  EGYPT. 

the  pictures  and  statues  in  the  temples  in  his  day  were  no  better 
than  those  made  "  ten  thousand  years  "  before. 

The  heroic,  or  colossal  size  of  many  of  the  Egyptian  statues 
excites  our  admiration.  The  two  colossi  at  Thebes,  known  as  the 
"  Statues  of  Memnon,"  are  forty-seven  feet  high,  and  are  hewn 
each  from  a  single  block  of  granite.  'The  appearance  of  these 
time-worn,  gigantic  figures,  upon  the  solitary  plain,  is  singularly 
impressive.  "  There  they  sit  together,  yet  apart,  in  the  midst 
of  the  plain,  serene  and  vigilant,  still  keeping  their  untired  watch 
over  the  lapse  of  ages  and  the  eclipse  of  Egypt." 

One  of  these  statues  acquired  a  wide  reputation  among  the 
Greeks  and  Romans,  under  the  name  of  the  "Vocal  Memnon." 
When  the  rays  of  the  rising  sun  fell  upon  the  colossus,  it  emitted 
low  musical  tones,  which  the  Egyptians  believed  to  be  the  greeting 
of  the  statue  to  the  mother-sun.1 

The  Egyptian  sphinxes  were  figures  having  a  human  head 
and  the  body  of  a  lion,  symbolizing  intelligence  and  power.  The 
most  famous  of  the  sphinxes  of  Egypt  is  the  colossal  figure 
at  the  base  of  the  Great  Pyramid,  at  Gizeh,  sculptured,  some 
think,  by  Menes,  and  others,  by  one  of  the  kings  of  the  Fourth 
Dynasty.  The  immense  statue,  cut  out  of  the  native  rock, 
save  the  fore-legs,  which  are  built  of  masonry,  is  ninety  feet  long 
and  seventy  feet  high.  "  This  huge,  mutilated  figure  has  an  aston- 
ishing effect ;  it  seems  like  an  eternal  spectre.  The  stone  phan- 
tom seems  attentive ;  one  would  say  that  it  hears  and  sees.  Its 
great  ear  appears  to  collect  the  sounds  of  the  past ;  its  eyes, 
directed  to  the  east,  gaze,  as  it  were,  into  the  future ;  its  aspect 
has  a  depth,  a  truth  of  expression,  irresistibly  fascinating  to  the 
spectator.  In  this  figure  —  half  statue,  half  mountain  —  we  see  a 
wonderful  majesty,  a  grand  serenity,  and  even  a  sort  of  sweetness 
of  expression." 

1  It  is  probable  that  the  musical  notes  were  produced  by  the  action  of  the 
sun  upon  the  surface  of  the  rock  while  wet  with  dew.  The  phenomenon  was 
observed  only  while  the  upper  part  of  the  colossus,  which  was  broken  off  by 
an  earthquake,  remained  upon  the  ground.  When  the  statue  was  restored, 
the  music  ceased. 


GLASS  MANUFACTURE.  35 

Glass  Manufacture. — The  manufacture  of  glass,  a  discovery 
usually  attributed  to  the  Phoenicians,1  was  carried  on  in  Egypt 
more  than  four  thousand  years  ago.  The  paintings  of  the  monu- 
ments represent  glass-blowers  moulding  all  manner  of  articles. 
Glass  bottles,  and  various  other  objects  of  the  same  material,  are 
found  in  great  numbers  in  the  tombs.  Some  of  these  objects 
show  that  the  ancient  Egyptians  were  acquainted  with  processes 
of  coloring  glass  that  secured  results  which  we  have  not  yet  been 
able  to  equal.  The  Egyptian  artists  imitated,  with  marvellous 
success,  the  variegated  hues  of  insects  and  stones.  The  manufac- 
ture of  precious  gems,  so  like  the  natural  stone  as  to  defy  detec- 
tion, was  a  lucrative  profession. 

The  Papyrus  Paper.  — The  chief  writing  material  used  by  the 
ancient  Egyptians  was  the  noted  papyrus  paper,  manufactured 
from  a  reed  which  grew  in  the  marshes  and  along  the  water-chan- 
nels of  the  Nile.  From  the  Greek  names  of  this  Egyptian  plant, 
byblos  and  papyrus,  come  our  words  "Bible  "  and  "  paper."  The 
plant  has  now  entirely  disappeared  from  Egypt,  and  is  found  only 
on  the  Anapus,  in  the  island  of  Sicily,  and  on  a  small  stream  near 
Jaffa,  in  Palestine.  Long  before  the  plant  became  extinct  in 
Egypt  an  ancient  prophecy  had  declared,  "  The  paper  reeds  by 
the  brooks  .  .  .  shall  wither,  be  driven  away,  and  be  no  more." 
(Isa.  xix.  7.)  The  costly  nature  of  the  papyrus  paper  led  to  the 
use  of  many  substitutes  for  writing  purposes  —  as  leather,  broken 
pottery,  tiles,  stones,  and  wooden  tablets. 

Forms  of  Writing.  —  The  Egyptians  employed  three  forms  of 
writing :  the  hieroglyphical,  consisting  of  rude  pictures  of  material 
objects,  usually  employed  in  monumental  inscriptions ;  the  hie- 
ratic, an  abbreviated  or  rather  simplified  form  of  the  hieroglyphi- 
cal, adapted  to  writing,  and  forming  the  greater  part  of  the  papyrus 
manuscripts  ;  and  the  demotic,  or  encorial,  a  still  simpler  form  than 
the  hieratic.    The  last  did  not  come  into  use  till  about  the  seventh 

1  The  Phanicians,  being  the  carriers  of  antiquity,  often  received  credit 
among  the  peoples  with  whom  they  traded,  for  various  inventions  and  discov- 
eries of  which  they  were  simply  the  disseminators. 


36  EGYPT. 

century  b.c,  and  was  then  used  for  all  ordinary  documents,  both 
of  a  civil  and  commercial  nature.  It  could  be  written  eight  or  ten 
times  as  fast  as  the  hieroglyphical  form. 

Key  to  Egyptian  Writing.  — The  key  to  the  Egyptian  writing 
was  discovered  by  means  of  the  Rosetta  Stdne.  This  valuable 
relic,  a  heavy  block  of  black  basalt,  is  now  in  the  British  Museum. 
It  holds  an  inscription,  written  in  hieroglyphic,  in  demotic,  and 
in  Greek  characters.  Champollion,  a  French  scholar,  by  com- 
paring the  characters  composing  the  words  Ptolemy,  Alexander, 
and  other  names  in  the  parallel  inscriptions,  discovered  the  value 
of  several  of  the  symbols ;  and  thus  were  opened  the  vast  libraries 
of  Egyptian  learning. 

We  have  now  the  Ritual,  or  Book,  of  the  Dead,  a  sort  of  guide 
to  the  soul  in  its  journey  through  the  underworld ;  romances,  and 
fairy  tales,  among  which  is  "  Cinderella  and  the  Glass  Slipper  "  ; 
autobiographies,  letters,  fables,  and  epics ;  treatises  on  medicine, 
astronomy,  and  various  other  scientific  subjects ;  and  books  on 
history  —  in  prose  and  verse  —  which  fully  justify  the  declaration 
of  the  Egyptian  priests  to  Solon  :  "  You  Greeks  are  mere  children, 
talkative  and  vain ;  you  know  nothing  at  all  of  the  past." 

Astronomy,  Geometry,  and  Arithmetic.  — The  cloudless  and 
brilliant  skies  of  Egypt  invited  the  inhabitants  of  the  Nile  valley 
to  the  study  of  the  heavenly  bodies.  And  another  circumstance 
closely  related  to  their  very  existence,  the  inundation  of  the  Nile, 
following  the  changing  cycles  of  the  stars,  could  not  but  have  in- 
cited them  to  the  watching  and  predicting  of  astronomical  move- 
ments. Their  observations  led  them  to  discover  the  length,  very 
nearly,  of  the  sidereal  year,  which  they  made  to  consist  of  365 
days,  every  fourth  year  adding  one  day,  making  the  number  for 
that  year  366.  They  also  divided  the  year  into  twelve  months  of 
thirty  days  each,  adding  five  days  to  complete  the  year.  This  was 
the  calendar  that  Julius  Caesar  introduced  into  the  Roman  Empire, 
and  which,  slightly  reformed  by  Pope  Gregory  XIII.  in  1582,  has 
been  the  system  employed  by  almost  all  the  civilized  world  up  to 
the  present  day. 


MEDICINE   AND    THE  ART   OE  EMBALMING.  37 

The  Greeks  accounted  for  the  early  rise  of  the  science  of  geome- 
try among  the  Egyptians  by  reference  to  the  necessity  they  were 
under  each  year  of  re-establishing  the  boundaries  of  their  fields  — 
the  inundation  obliterating  old  landmarks  and  divisions.  The 
science  thus  forced  upon  their  attention  was  cultivated  with  zeal 
and  success.  A  single  papyrus  has  been  discovered  that  holds 
twelve  geometrical  theorems. 

Arithmetic  was  necessarily  brought  into  requisition  in  solving 
astronomical  and  geometrical  problems.  We  ourselves  are  debtors 
to  the  ancient  Egyptians  for  much  of  our  mathematical  knowledge, 
which  has  come  to  us  from  the  banks  of  the  Nile,  through  the 
Greeks  and  the  Saracens. 

Medicine  and  the  Art  of  Embalming.  —  The  custom  of  em- 
balming the  dead,  affording  opportunities  for  the  examination  of 
the  body,  without  doubt  had  a  great  influence  upon  the  develop- 
ment of  the  sciences  of  anatomy  and  medicine  among  the  Egyp- 
tians. That  the  embalmers  were  physicians,  we  know  from  various 
testimonies.  Thus  we  are  told  in  the  Bible  that  Joseph  "  com- 
manded the  physicians  to  embalm  his  father."  The  Egyptian 
doctors  had  a  very  great  reputation  among  the  ancients. 

Every  doctor  was  a  specialist,  and  was  not  allowed  to  take 
charge  of  cases  outside  of  his  own  branch.  As  the  artist  was  for- 
bidden to  change  the  lines  of  the  sacred  statues,  so  the  physician 
was  not  permitted  to  treat  cases  save  in  the  manner  prescribed  by 
the  customs  of  the  past ;  and  if  he  were  so  presumptuous  as  to 
depart  from  the  established  mode  of  treatment,  and  the  patient 
died,  he  was  adjudged  guilty  of  murder.  Many  drugs  and  medi- 
cines were  used  ;  the  ciphers,  or  characters,  employed  by  modern 
apothecaries  to  designate  grains  and  drams  are  of  Egyptian  in- 
vention. 

The  Egyptians  believed  that  after  a  long  lapse  of  time,  several 
thousand  years,  the  departed  soul  would  return  to  earth  and  reani- 
mate its  former  body  ;  hence  their  custom  of  preserving  the  body 
by  means  of  embalmment.  In  the  processes  of  embalming,  the 
physicians  made  use  of  oils,  resin,  bitumen,  and  various  aromatic 


3S 


EGYPT. 


gums.  The  body  was  swathed  in  bandages  of  linen,  while  the 
face  was  sometimes  gilded,  or  covered  with  a  gold  mask.  As  this, 
which  was  the  "  most  approved  method  "  of  embalming,  was  very 
costly,  the  expense  being  equivalent  probably  to  $1000  of  our 
money,  the  bodies  of  the  poorer  classes  were  simply  "  salted  and 
dried,"  wrapped  in  coarse  mats,  and  laid  in  tiers  in  great  trenches 
in  the  desert  sands. 


PROFILE  OF  RAMESES  li.     (From  a  photograph  of  the  mummy.) 

Only  a  few  years  ago  (in  1881)  the  mummies  of  Thothmes  III., 
Seti  I.,  and  Rameses  II.,  together  with  those  of  nearly  all  of  the 
other  Pharaohs  of  the  Eighteenth,  Nineteenth,  Twentieth,  and 
Twenty-first  Dynasties,  were  found  in  a  secret  cave  near  Thebes. 


THE   ART   OF  EMBALMING.  39 

It  seems  that,  some  time  in  the  12th  century  B.C.,  a  sudden 
alarm  caused  these  bodies  to  be  taken  hastily  from  the  royal  tombs 
of  which  we  have  spoken  (see  p.  31),  and  secreted  in  this  hidden 
chamber.  When  the  danger  had  passed,  the  place  of  concealment 
had  evidently  been  forgotten ;  so  the  bodies  were  never  restored 
to  their  ancient  tombs,  but  remained  in  this  secret  cavern  to  be 
discovered  in  our  own  day. 

The  mummies  were  taken  to  the  Boulak  Museum,  at  Cairo, 
where  they  were  identified  by  means  of  the  inscriptions  upon  the 
cases  and  wrappings.  Among  others  the  body  of  Seti  I.  and  that 
of  Rameses  II.  were  unbandaged  (1886),  so  that  now  we  may 
look  upon  the  faces  of  the  greatest  and  most  renowned  of  the 
Pharaohs.  The  faces  of  both  Seti  and  Rameses  are  so  remarkably 
preserved,  that  "were  their  subjects  to  return  to  earth  to-day 
they  could  not  fail  to  recognize  their  old  sovereigns."  Both  are 
strong  faces,  of  Semitic  cast,  that  of  Rameses  bearing  a  striking 
resemblance  to  that  of  his  father  Seti,  and  both  closely  resembling 
their  portrait  statues  and  profiles.  Professor  Maspero,  the  direc- 
tor-general of  the  excavations  and  antiquities  of  Egypt,  in  his 
official  report  of  the  uncovering  of  the  mummies,  writes  as  follows 
of  the  appearance  of  the  face  of  Rameses :  "  The  face  of  the 
mummy  gives  a  fair  idea  of  the  face  of  the  living  king.  The 
expression  is  unintellectual,  perhaps  slightly  animal ;  but  even 
under  the  somewhat  grotesque  disguise  of  mummification,  there 
is  plainly  to  be  seen  an  air  of  sovereign  majesty,  of  resolve,  and 
of  pride."  l 

1  On  the  finding  and  identification  of  the  Tharaohs,  consult  two  excellent 
articles  in  The  Century  Magazine  for  May,  1887. 


40  CHALD&A. 


CHAPTER    III.     # 

CHALD^A. 
i.   Political  History. 

Basin  of  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates. — The  northern  part  of 
the  Tigris  and  Euphrates  valley,  the  portion  that  comprised  ancient 
Assyria,  consists  of  undulating  plains,  broken  in  places  by  con- 
siderable mountain  ridges. 

But  all  the  southern  portion  of  the  basin,  the  part  known  as 
Chaldaea,  or  Babylonia,  having  been  formed  by  the  gradual  en- 
croachment of  the  deposits  of  the  Tigris  and  Euphrates  upon  the 
waters  of  the  Persian  Gulf,  is  as  level  as  the  sea.  During  a  large 
part  of  the  year,  rains  are  infrequent ;  hence  agriculture  is  depend- 
ent mainly  upon  artificial  irrigation.  The  distribution  of  the 
waters  of  the  Tigris  and  the  Euphrates  was  secured,  in  ancient 
times,  by  a  stupendous  system  of  canals  and  irrigants,  which,  at  the 
present  day,  in  a  sand-choked  and  ruined  condition,  spread  like  a 
perfect  network  over  the  face  of  the  country  (see  cut,  p.  41). 

The  productions  of  Babylonia  are  very  like  those  of  the  Nile 
valley.  The  luxuriant  growth  of  grain  upon  these  alluvial  flats 
excited  the  wonder  of  all  the  Greek  travellers  who  visited  the  East. 
Herodotus  will  not  tell  the  whole  truth,  for  fear  his  veracity  may 
be  doubted.  The  soil  is  as  fertile  now  as  in  the  time  of  the  histo- 
rian ;  but  owing  to  the  neglect  of  the  ancient  canals,  the  greater 
part  of  this  once  populous  district  has  been  converted  into  alter- 
nating areas  of  marsh  and  desert. 

The  Three  Great  Monarchies.  —  Within  the  Tigris- Euphrates 
basin,  three  great  empires  —  the  Chaldsean,  the  Assyrian,  and  the 
Babylonian  —  successively  rose  to  prominence  and  dominion. 
Each,  in  turn,  not  only  extended  its  authority  over  the  valley,  but 


A   MIXED  PEOPLE. 


II 


also  made  the  power  of  its  arms  felt  throughout  the  adjoining 
regions.  We  shall  now  trace  the  rise  and  the  varied  fortunes  of 
these  empires,  and  the  slow  growth  of  the  arts  and  sciences  from 
rude  beginnings  among  the  early  Chaldaeans  to  their  fuller  and 
richer  development  under  the  Assyrian  and  Babylonian  monarchies. 
The  Chaldaeans  a  Mixed  People.  —  In  the  earliest  times  Lower 
Chaldrea  was  known  as  Shumir,  the  Shinar  of  the  Bible,  while 
Upper  Chaldaea  bore  the  name  of  Accad.  The  original  inhabi- 
tants of  Chaldaea  were  of  Turanian  race,  and  are  called  Accadians. 


ANCIENT  BAB^ 


:anals. 


These  people  laid  the  basis  of  civilization  in  the  Euphrates 
valley,  so  that  with  them  the  history  of  Asian  culture  begins. 
They  brought  with  them  into  the  valley  the  art  of  hieroglyphical 
writing,  which  later  developed  into  the  well-known  cuneiform 
system.  They  also  had  quite  an  extensive  literature,  and  had 
made  considerable  advance  in  the  art  of  building. 

The  civilization  of  the  Accadians  was  given  a  great  impulse  by 
the  arrival  of  a  Semitic  people.  These  foreigners  were  nomadic 
in  habits,  and  altogether  much  less  cultured  than  the  Accadians. 


42  CHALDAEA. 

Gradually,  however,  they  adopted  the  arts  and  literature  of  the 
people  among  whom  they  had  settled ;  yet  they  retained  their 
own  language,  which  in  the  course  of  time  superseded  the  less 
perfect  Turanian  speech  of  the  original  inhabitants  ;  consequently 
the  mixed  people,  known  later  as  Chaldaeans^that  arose  from  the 
blending  of  the  two  races,  spoke  a  language  essentially  the  same 
as  that  used  by  their  northern  neighbors,  the  Semitic  Assyrians. 

Sargon  (Sharrakin)  I.  (3800?  b.c.)  .  —  We  know  scarcely 
anything  about  the  political  affairs  of  the  Accadians  until  after  the 
arrival  of  the  Semites.  Then,  powerful  kings,  sometimes  of  Se- 
mitic and  then  again  of  Turanian,  or  Accadian  origin,  appear  ruling 
in  the  cities  of  Accad  and  Shumir,  and  the  political  history  of 
Chaldaea  begins. 

The  first  prominent  monarch  is  called  Sargon  I.  (Sharrukin), 
a  Semitic  king  of  Agade,  one  of  the  great  early  cities.  An  inscrip- 
tion recently  deciphered  makes  this  king  to  have  reigned  as  early 
as  3800  B.C.  He  appears  to  have  been  the  first  great  organizer  of 
the  peoples  of  the  Chaldaean  plains. 

Yet  not  as  a  warrior,  but  as  a  patron  and  protector  of  letters,  is 
Sargon's  name  destined  to  a  sure  place  in  history.  He  classified 
and  translated  into  the  Semitic,  or  Assyrian  tongue  the  religious, 
mythological,  and  astronomical  literature  of  the  Accadians,  and 
deposited  the  books  in  great  libraries,  which  he  established  or 
enlarged,  —  the  oldest  and  most  valuable  libraries  of  the  ancient 
world.     The  scholar  Sayce  calls  him  the  Chaldaean  Solomon. 

Conquest  of  Chaldaea  by  the  Elamites  (2286  b.c).  —  While 
the  Chaldaean  kings  were  ruling  in  the  great  cities  of  Lower  Baby- 
lonia, the  princes  of  the  Elamites,  a  people  of  Turanian  race,  were 
setting  up  a  rival  kingdom  to  the  northeast,  just  at  the  foot  of  the 
hills  of  Persia. 

In  the  year  2286  B.C.,  a  king  of  Elam,  Kudur-Nakhunta  by 
name,  overran  Chaldaea,  took  all  the  cities  founded  by  Sargon  and 
his  successors,  and  from  the  temples  bore  off  in  triumph  to  his 
capital,  Susa,  the  statues  of  the  Chaldaean  gods,  and  set  up  in  these 
lowland  regions  what  is  known  as  the  Elamite  Dynasty. 


CHALDjEA  ECLIPSED  BY  ASSYRIA.  43 

More  than  sixteen  hundred  years  after  this  despoiling  of  the 
Chaldean  sanctuaries,  a  king  of  Nineveh  captured  the  city  of 
Susa,  and  finding  there  these  stolen  statues,  caused  them  to  be 
restored  to  their  original  temples. 

The  Chedorlaomer  of  Genesis,  whose  contact  with  the  history 
of  the  Jewish  patriarch  Abraham  has  caused  his  name  to  be 
handed  down  to  our  own  times  in  the  records  of  the  Hebrew 
people,  is  believed  to  have  been  the  son  and  successor  of  Kudur- 
Nakhunta. 

Chaldaea  eclipsed  by  Assyria. — After  the  Elamite  princes  had 
maintained  a  more  or  less  perfect  dominion  over  the  cities  of 
Chaldaea  for  two  or  three  centuries,  their  power  seems  to  have 
declined ;  and  then  for  several  centuries  longer,  down  to  about 
1300  B.C.,  dynasties  and  kings  of  which  we  know  very  little  as  yet, 
ruled  the  country. 

During  this  period,  Babylon,  gradually  rising  into  prominence, 
overshadowed  the  more  ancient  Accadian  cities,  and  became  the 
leading  city  of  the  land.  From  it  the  whole  country  was  destined, 
later,  to  draw  the  name  by  which  it  is  best  known  —  Babylonia. 

Meanwhile  a  Semitic  power  had  been  slowly  developing  in  the 
north.  This  was  the  Assyrian  empire,  the  later  heart  and  centre 
of  which  was  the  great  city  of  Nineveh.  For  a  long  time  Assyria 
was  simply  a  province  or  dependency  of  the  lower  kingdom ;  but 
about  1300  B.C.,  the  Assyrian  monarch  Tiglathi-nin  conquered 
Babylonia,  and  Assyria  assumed  the  place  that  had  been  so  long 
held  by  Chaldaea.  From  this  time  on  to  the  fall  of  Nineveh  in 
606  B.C.,  the  monarchs  of  this  country  virtually  controlled  the 
affairs  of  Western  Asia. 

2.  Arts  and  General  Culture. 

Tower-Temples.  —In  the  art  of  building,  the  Chaldaeans,  though 
their  edifices  fall  far  short  of  attaining  the  perfection  exhibited  by 
the  earliest  Egyptian  structures,  displayed  no  inconsiderable  archi- 
tectural knowledge  and  skill. 


44  CHALDMA. 

The  most  important  of  their  constructions  were  their  tower- 
temples.  These  were  simple  in  plan,  consisting  of  two  or  three 
terraces,  or  stages,  placed  one  upon  another  so  as  to  form  a  sort 
of  rude  pyramid.  The  material  used  in  their  construction  was 
chiefly  sun-dried  brick.  The  edifice  was  sometimes  protected  by 
outer  courses  of  burnt  brick.  The  temple  proper  surmounted  the 
upper  platform. 

All  these  tower-temples  have  crumbled  into  vast  mounds,  with 
only  here  and  there  a  projecting  mass  of  masonry  to  distinguish 
them  from  natural  hills,  for  which  they  were  at  first  mistaken. 

Cuneiform  Writing.  —  We  have  already  mentioned  the  fact 
that  the  Accadians,  when  they  entered  the  Euphrates  valley,  were 
in  possession  of  a  system  of  writing.  This  was  a  simple  pictorial, 
or  hieroglyphical  system,  which  they  gradually  developed  into  the 
cuneiform. 

In  the  cuneiform  system,  the  characters,  instead  of  being  formed 
of  unbroken  lines,  are  composed  of  wedge-like  marks ;  hence  the 
name  (from  cuneus,  a  wedge).  This  form,  according  to  the 
scholar  Sayce,  arose  when  the  Accadians,  having  entered  the  low 
country,  substituted  tablets  of  clay  for  the  papyrus  or  other  similar 
material  which  they  had  formerly  used.  The  characters  were  im- 
pressed upon  the  soft  tablet  by  means  of  a  triangular  writing- 
instrument,  which  gave  them  their  peculiar  wedge-shaped  form. 

The  cuneiform  mode  of  writing,  improved  and  simplified  by  the 
Assyrians  and  the  Persians,  was  in  use  about  two  thousand  years, 
being  employed  by  the  nations  in  and  near  the  Euphrates  basin, 
down  to  the  time  of  the  conquest  of  the  East  by  the  Macedonians. 

Books  and  Libraries. — The  books  of  the  Chaldaeans  were 
composed  of  clay  tablets,  varying  in  length  from  one  inch  to  twelve 
inches,  and  being  about  one  inch  thick.  Those  holding  records 
of  special  importance,  after  having  been  once  written  over  and 
baked,  were  covered  with  a  thin  coating  of  clay,  and  then  the 
matter  was  written  in  duplicate  and  the  tablets  again  baked.  If 
the  outer  writing  were  defaced  by  accident  or  altered  by  design, 
the  removal  of  the  outer  coating  would  at  once  show  the  true  text. 


THE  RELIGION. 


45 


The  tablets  were  carefully  preserved  in  great  public  libraries. 
Even  during  the  Turanian  period,  before  the  Semites  had  entered 
the  land,  one  or  more  of  these  collec- 
tions existed  in  each  of  the  chief  cities 
of  Accad  and  Shumir.  "  Accad,"  says 
Sayce,  "  was  the  China  of  Asia.  Almost 
every  one  could  read  and  write." 
Erech  was  especially  renowned  for  its 
great  library,  and  was  known  as  "the 
City  of  Books." 

The  Religion.  —  The  Accadian  re- 
ligion, as  revealed  by  the  tablets,  was 
essentially  the  same  as  that  held  to- 
day by  the  nomadic  Turanian  tribes 
of  Northern  Asia  —  what  is  known  as 
Shamanism.  It  consisted  in  a  belief  in 
good  and  evil  spirits,  of  which  the  latter 
held  by  far  the  most  prominent  place. 
To  avert  the  malign  influence  of  these 
wicked  spirits,  the  Accadians  had  resort 

to  charms  and  magic  rites.  The  religion  of  the  Semites  was  a 
form  of  Sabaeanism,  —  that  is,  a  worship  of  the  heavenly  bodies, 
—  in  which  the  sun  was  naturally  the  central  object  of  adoration. 

When  the  Accadians  and  the  Semites  intermingled,  their  re- 
ligious systems  blended  to  form  one  of  the  most  influential  relig- 
ions of  the  world  —  one  which  spread  far  and  wide  under  the 
form  of  Baal  worship.  There  were  in  the  perfected  system  twelve 
primary  gods,  at  whose  head  stood  II,  or  Ra.  Besides  these  great 
divinities,  there  were  numerous  lesser  and  local  deities. 

There  were  features  of  this  old  Chaldaean  religion  which  were 
destined  to  exert  a  wide-spread  and  potent  influence  upon  the 
minds  of  men.  Out  of  the  Sabaean  Semitic  element  grew  astrology, 
the  pretended  art  of  forecasting  events  by  the  aspect  of  the  stars, 
which  was  most  elaborately  and  ingeniously  developed,  until  the 
fame  of  the   Chaldaean   astrologers  was   spread   throughout   the 


CHALD/EAN  TABLET. 


-16 


CHALD^EA. 


ancient  world,  while  the  spell  of  that  art  held  in  thraldom  the 
mind  of  mediaeval  Europe. 

Out  of  the  Shamanistic  element  contributed  by  the  Turanian 
Accadians,  grew  a  system  of  magic  and  divination  which  had  a 
most  profound  influence  not  only  upon  all  the  Eastern  nations, 
including  the  Jews,  but  also  upon  the  later  peoples  of  the  West. 
Mediaeval  magic  and  witchcraft  were,  in  large  part,  an  unchanged 
inheritance  from  Chaldaea. 

The  Chaldaean  Genesis.  — The  cosmological  myths  of  the  Chal- 
daeans,  that  is,  their  stories  of  the  origin  of  things,  are  remarkably 
like  the  first  chapters  of  Genesis. 


CHALD/EAN  TABLET  WITH   PARTS  OF  THE  DELUGE  LEGEND. 


The  discoveries  and  patient  labors  of  various  scholars  have  re- 
produced, in  a  more  or  less  perfect  form,  from  the  legendary 
tablets,  the  Chaldaean  account  of  the  Creation  of  the  World,  of  an 
ancestral  Paradise  and  the  Tree  of  Life  with  its  angel  guardians, 
of  the  Deluge,  and  of  the  Tower  of  Babel.1 

The  Chaldaean  Epic  of  Izdubar.  —  Beside  their  cosmological 

1  Consult  especially  George  Smith's  The  Chaldaan  Account  of  Genesis; 
see  also  Records  of  the  Past,  Vol.  VII.  pp.  127,  131. 


THE   CHALDEAN  EPIC  OF  IZDUBAR.  47 

myths,  the  Chaldaeans  had  a  vast  number  of  so-called  heroic  and 
nature  myths.  The  most  noted  of  these  form  what  is  known  as 
the  Epic  of  Izdubar  (Nimrod?),  which  is  doubtless  the  oldest 
epic  of  the  race.  This  is  in  twelve  parts,  and  is  really  a  solar 
myth,  which  recounts  the  twelve  labors  of  the  sun  in  his  yearly 
passage  through  the  twelve  signs  of  the  Chaldaean  zodiac. 

This  epic  was  carried  to  the  West,  by  the  way  of  Phoenicia  and 
Asia  Minor,  and  played  a  great  part  in  the  mythology  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans.  "The  twelve  labors  of  Heracles  may  be 
traced  back  to  the  adventures  of  Gisdhubar  [Izdubar]  as  recorded 
in  the  twelve  books  of  the  great  epic  of  Chaldaea."     (Sayce.) 

Science.  —  In  astronomy  and  arithmetic  the  Chaldaeans  made 
substantial  progress.  The  clear  sky  and  unbroken  horizon  of  the 
Chaldaean  plains,  lending  an  unusually  brilliant  aspect  to  the 
heavens,  naturally  led  the  Chaldaeans  to  the  study  of  the  stars. 
They  early  divided  the  zodiac  into  twelve  signs,  and  named  the 
zodiacal  constellations,  a  memorial  of  their  astronomical  attain- 
ments which  will  remain  forever  inscribed  upon  the  great  circle  of 
the  heavens ;  they  foretold  eclipses,  constructed  sun-dials  of  vari- 
ous patterns,  divided  the  year  into  twelve  months,  and  the  day 
and  night  into  twelve  hours  each,  and  invented  or  devised  the 
week  of  seven  days,  the  number  of  days  in  the  week  being  deter- 
mined by  the  course  of  the  moon.  "The  7th,  14th,  19th,  21st, 
and  28th  days  of  the  lunar  month  were  kept  like  the  Jewish  Sab- 
bath, and  were  actually  so  named  in  Assyria." 

In  arithmetic,  also,  the  Chaldaeans  made  considerable  advance. 
A  tablet  has  been  found  which  contains  the  squares  and  cubes  of 
the  numbers  from  one  to  sixty. 

Conclusion. — This  hasty  glance  at  the  beginnings  of  civiliza- 
tion among  the  primitive  peoples  of  the  Euphrates  valley,  will 
serve  to  give  us  at  least  some  little  idea  of  how  much  modern  cul- 
ture owes  to  the  old  Chaldaeans.  We  may  say  that  Chaldaea  was 
one  of  the  main  sources  —  Egypt  was  the  other  —  of  the  stream  of 
universal  history. 


48  ASSYRIA. 


CHAPTER   IV.      - 

ASSYRIA. 
i.   Political   History. 

Tiglath-Pileser  I.  (1130-1110  b.c).  —  It  is  not  until  about 
two  centuries  after  the  conquest  of  Chaldsea  by  the  Assyrian  prince 
Tiglathi-Nin  (see  p.  43),  that  we  find  a  sovereign  of  renown  at  the 
head  of  Assyrian  affairs.  This  was  Tiglath-Pileser  I.,  who  came  to 
the  throne  about  11 30  b.c.  The  royal  records  detail  at  great 
length  his  numerous  war  expeditions,  and  describe  minutely  the 
great  temples  which  he  constructed. 

For  the  two  centuries  following  the  reign  of  Tiglath-Pileser, 
Assyria  is  quite  lost  to  history ;  then  it  is  again  raised  into  prom- 
inence by  two  or  three  strong  kings ;  after  which  it  once  more 
almost  "  drops  below  the  historical  horizon." 

Tiglath-Pileser  II.  (745-727  b.c).  —  With  this  king,  who  was 
a  usurper,  begins  what  is  known  as  the  Second  Empire.  He  was 
a  man  of  great  energy  and  of  undoubted  military  talent,  —  for  by 
him  the  Assyrian  power  was  once  more  extended  over  the  greater 
part  of  Southwestern  Asia. 

But  what  renders  the  reign  of  this  king  a  landmark  in  Assyrian 
history,  is  the  fact  that  he  was  not  a  mere  conqueror  like  his  pred- 
ecessors, but  a  political  organizer  of  great  capacity.  He  laid  the 
basis  of  the  power  and  glory  of  the  great  kings  who  followed  him 
upon  the  Assyrian  throne. 

Sargon  (722-705  b.c).  —  Sargon  was  one  of  the  greatest  con- 
querors and  builders  of  the  Second  Empire.  In  722  B.C.,  he  took 
Samaria  and  carried  away  the  Ten  Tribes  into  captivity  beyond 
the  Tigris.  The  larger  part  of  the  captives  were  scattered  among 
the  Median  towns,  where  they  became  so  mingled  with  the  native 


SENNACHERIB.  49 

population  as  to  be  inquired  after  even  to  this  day  as  the  "  lost 
tribes." 

During  this  reign  the  Egyptians  and  their  allies,  in  the  first  en- 
counter (the  battle  of  Raphia,  720  B.C.)  between  the  empires  of 
the  Euphrates  and  the  Nile  valley,  suffered  a  severe  defeat,  and 
the  ancient  kingdom  of  the  Pharaohs  became  tributary  to  As- 
syria. 

Sargon  was  a  famous  builder.  Near  the  foot  of  the  Persian  hills 
he  founded  a  large  city,  which  he  named  for  himself;  and  there 
he  erected  a  royal  residence,  described  in  the  inscriptions  as  "  a 
palace  of  incomparable  magnificence,"  the  site  of  which  is  now 
preserved  by  the  vast  mounds  of  Khorsabad. 

Sennacherib  (705-681  b.c).  —  Sennacherib,  the  son  of  Sargon, 
came  to  the  throne  705  B.C.  We  must  accord  to  him  the  first 
place  of  renown  among  all  the  great  names  of  the  Assyrian  Em- 
pire. His  name,  connected  as  it  is  with  the  story  of  the  Jews,  and 
with  many  of  the  most  wonderful  discoveries  among  the  ruined 
palaces  of  Nineveh,  has  become  as  familiar  to  the  ear  as  that  of 
Nebuchadnezzar  in  the  story  of  Babylon. 

The  fulness  of  the  royal  inscriptions  of  this  reign  enables  us  to 
permit  Sennacherib  to  tell  us  in  his  own  words  of  his  great  works 
and  military  expeditions.  Respecting  the  decoration  of  Nineveh, 
he  says :  "  I  raised  again  all  the  edifices  of  Nineveh,  my  royal 
city  j  1  reconstructed  all  its  old  streets,  and  widened  those  that 
were  too  narrow.  I  have  made  the  whole  town  a  city  shining  like 
the  sun." 

Concerning  an  expedition  against  Hezekiah,  king  of  Judah,  he 
says :  "  I  took  forty-six  of  his  strong  fenced  cities ;  and  of  the 
smaller  towns  which  were  scattered  about  I  took  and  plundered  a 
countless  number.  And  from  these  places  I  captured  and  carried 
off  as  spoil  200,150  people,  old  and  young,  male  and  female,  to- 
gether with  horses  and  mares,  asses  and  camels,  oxen  and  sheep, 
a  countless  multitude.  And  Hezekiah  himself  I  shut  up  in  Jeru- 
salem, his  capital  city,  like  a  bird  in  a  cage,  building  towers  round 


50 


ASSYRIA, 


the  city  to  hem  him  in,  and  raising  banks  of  earth  against  the 
gates,  so  as  to  prevent  escape."1 

While  Sennacherib  was  besieging  Jerusalem,  the  king  of  Egypt 
appeared  in  the  field  in  the  south  with  aid  for  Hezekiah.  This 
caused  Sennacherib  to  draw  off  his  forces  from^the  siege  to  meet 
the  new  enemy ;  but  near  the  frontiers  of  Egypt  the  Assyrian  host, 
according  to  the  Hebrew  account,  was  smitten  by  "  the  angel  of 
the  Lord," 2  and  the  king  returned  with  a  shattered  army  and  with- 
out glory  to  his  capital,  Nineveh. 

Sennacherib  employed  the  closing  years  of  his  reign  in  the  dig- 
ging of  canals,  and  in  the  erection  of  a  splendid  palace  at  Nineveh. 
He  was  finally  murdered  by  his  own  sons. 


SIEGE   OF   A   CITY,    SHOWING    USE   OF    BATTERING-RAM.     (From  Nimrud.) 

Asshur-bani-pal  (668-626?  B.C.). —  This  king,  the  Sardanapa- 
lus  of  the  Greeks,  is  distinguished  for  his  magnificent  patronage  of 
art  and  literature.  During  his  reign  Assyria  enjoyed  her  Augustan 
age. 

But  Asshur-bani-pal  was  also  possessed  of  a  warlike  spirit.     He 


1  Rawlinson's  Ancient  Monarchies,  Vol.  II.  p.  161. 

2  This  expression  is  a  Hebraism,  meaning  often  any  physical  cause  of  de- 
struction, as  a  plague  or  storm.  In  the  present  case,  the  destroying  agency 
was  probably  a  pestilence. 


ESARHADDON  II.  51 

broke  to  pieces,  with  terrible  energy,  jn  swift  campaigns,  the  en- 
emies of  his  empire.  All  the  scenes  of  his  sieges  and  battles 
he  caused  to  be  sculptured  on  the  walls  of  his  palace  at  Nineveh. 
These  pictured  panels  are  now  in  the  British  Museum.  They  are 
a  perfect  Iliad  in  stone. 

Saracus,  or  Esarhaddon  II.  (?-6o6  b.c).  —  Saracus  was  the 
last  of  the  long  line  of  Assyrian  kings.  His  reign  was  filled  with 
misfortunes  for  himself  and  his  kingdom.  For  nearly  or  quite  seven 
centuries  the  Ninevite  kings  had  lorded  it  over  the  East.  There 
was  scarcely  a  state  in  all  Western  Asia  that  had  not,  during  this 
time,  felt  the  weight  of  their  conquering  arms ;  scarcely  a  people 
that  had  not  suffered  their  cruel  punishments,  or  tasted  the  bitter- 
ness of  their  servitude. 

But  now  swift  misfortunes  were  bearing  down  upon  the  oppressor 
from  every  quarter.  The  Scythian  hordes,  breaking  through  the 
mountain  gates  on  the  north,  spread  a  new  terror  throughout  the 
upper  Assyrian  provinces ;  from  the  mountain  defiles  on  the  east 
issued  the  armies  of  the  recent-grown  empire  of  the  Aryan  Medes, 
led  by  the  renowned  Cyaxares ;  from  the  southern  lowlands,  anx- 
ious to  aid  in  the  overthrow  of  the  hated  oppressor,  the  Baby- 
lonians, led  by  the  youthful  Nebuchadnezzar,  the  son  of  the  traitor 
viceroy  Nabopolassar,  joined,  it  appears,  the  Medes  as  allies,  and 
together  they  laid  close  siege  to  the  Assyrian  capital. 

The  operations  of  the  besiegers  seem  to  have  been  aided  by  an 
unusual  inundation  of  the  Tigris,  which  undermined  a  section  of 
the  city  walls.  At  all  events  the  place  was  taken,  and  dominion 
passed  away  forever  from  the  proud  capital1  (606  b.c).  Two 
hundred  years  later,  when  Xenophon  with  his  Ten  Thousand 
ks,  in  his  memorable  retreat  (see  p.  156),  passed  the  spot, 
the  once  great  city  was  a  crumbling  mass  of  ruins,  of  which  he 
could  not  even  learn  the  name. 

-aracus,  in  his  despair,  is  said  to  have  erected  a  funeral  pyre  within  one 
of  the  courts  of  his  palace,  and,  mounting  the  pile  with  the  members  of  his 
family,  to  have  perished  with  them  in  the  flames;  but  this  is  doubtless  a  poeti- 
cal embellish ment  of  the  story. 


52 


ASSYRIA. 


2.    Religion,  Arts,  and  General  Culture. 

Religion. — The  Assyrians  were  Semites,  and  as  such  they 
possessed  the  deep  religious  spirit  that  has  always  distinguished 
the  peoples  of  this  family.  In  this  respect  the^  were  very  much 
like  the  Hebrews.  The  wars  which  the  Assyrian  monarchs  waged 
were  not  alone  wars  of  conquest,  but  were,  in  a  certain  sense,  cru- 
sades made  for  the  purpose  of  extending  the  worship  and  author- 
ity of  the  gods  of  Assyria.  They  have  been  likened  to  the  wars  of 
the  Hebrew  kings,  and  again  to  the  conquests  of  the  Saracens. 

As  with  the  wars,  so  was  it  with  the  architectural  works  of 
these  sovereigns.  Greater  attention,  indeed,  was  paid  to  the 
palace  in  Assyria  than  in  Babylonia ;  yet  the  inscriptions,  as 
well  as  the  ruins,  of  the  upper  country  attest  that  the  erection 
and  adornment  of  the  temples  of  the  gods  were  matters  of 
anxious  and  constant  care  on  the  part  of  the  Assyrian  monarchs. 
Their  accounts  of  the  construction  and  dedication  of  temples 
for  their  gods  afford  striking  parallels  to  the  Bible  account 
of  the  building  of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem  by  King   Solomon. 

Not  less  promi- 
nently manifested  is 
the  religious  spirit 
of  these  kings  in 
what  we  may  call 
their  sacred  litera- 
ture, which  is  filled 
with  prayers  singu- 
larly like  those  of 
the  Old  Testament. 
As  to  the  Assyrian 
deities  and  their  wor- 
ship, these  were  in  all  their  essential  characteristics  so  similar  to 
those  of  the  later  Chaldaean  system,  already  described  (see  p.  45), 
that  any  detailed  account  of  them  here  is  unnecessary.  One  differ- 
ence, however,  in  the  two  systems  should  be  noted.     The  place 


EMBLEM   OF  ASSHUR. 


CRUELTY  OF  THE  ASSYRIANS. 


53 


occupied  by  II,  or  Ra,  as  the  head  of  the  Chaldsean  deities, 
is  in  Assyria  given  to  the  national  god  Asshur,  whose  emblem 
was  a  winged  circle  with  the  figure  of  a  man  within,  the  whole 
perhaps  symbolizing,  according  to  Rawlinson,  eternity,  omnipres- 
ence, and  wisdom. 

Cruelty  of  the  Assyrians.  —  The  Assyrians  have  been  called 
the  "  Romans  of  Asia."  They  were  a  proud,  martial,  cruel,  and 
unrelenting  race.  Although  possessing,  as  we  have  just  noticed, 
a  deep  and  genuine  religious  feeling,  still  the  Assyrian  monarchs 
often  displayed  in  their  treatment  of  prisoners  the  disposition  of 
savages.  In  common  with  most  Asiatics,  they  had  no  respect  for 
the  body,  but  subjected  captives  to  the  most  terrible  mutilations. 
The  sculptured  marbles  taken  from  the  palaces  exhibit  the  cruel 


ASSYRIANS   FLAYING   THEIR    PRISONERS  ALIVE. 


f  rtures  inflicted  upon  prisoners ;  kings  are  being  led  before  their 
•nqueror  by  means  of  hooks  thrust  through  one  or  both  lips;1 
other  prisoners  are  being  flayed  alive ;  the  eyes  of  some  are  being 
bored  out  with  the  point  of  a  spear ;  and  still  others  are  having 
their  tongues  torn  out. 

An  inscription  by  Asshur-nasir-pal,  found  in  one  of  the  palaces 
at  Nimrud,  runs  as  follows :  "  Their  men,  young  and  old,  I  took 
prisoners.  Of  some  I  cut  off  the  feet  and  hands ;  of  others  I  cut 
off  the  noses,  ears,  and  lips ;  of  the  young  men's  ears  I  made  a 

1  See  2  Chron.  xxxiii.  10-13  (Revised  Version). 


54  ASSYRIA. 

heap ;  of  the  old  men's  heads  I  built  a  tower.  I  exposed  their 
heads  as  a  trophy  in  front  of  their  city.  The  male  children  and 
the  female  children  I  burned  in  the  flames." 

Royal  Sports.  —  The  Assyrian  king  gloried  in  being,  like  the 
great  Nimrod,  "  a  mighty  hunter  before  the  Lord."  The  monu- 
ments are  covered  with  sculptures  that  represent  the  king  engaged 
in  the  favorite  royal  sport.  Asshur-izer-pal  had  at  Nineveh  a  men- 
agerie, or  hunting-park,  filled  with  various  animals,  many  of  which 
were  sent  him  as  tribute  by  vassal  princes. 


LION  HUNT.     (From  Nineveh.) 

Remains  of  Assyrian  Cities.  —  Enormous  grass-grown  mounds, 
enclosed  by  crumbled  ramparts,  alone  mark  the  sites  of  the  great 
cities  of  the  Assyrian  kings.  The  character  of  the  remains  arises 
from  the  nature  of  the  building  material.  City  walls,  palaces,  and 
temples  were  constructed  chiefly  of  sun-dried  bricks,  so  that  the 
generation  that  raised  them  had  scarcely  passed  away  before  they 
began  to  sink  down  into  heaps  of  rubbish.  The  rains  of  many 
centuries  have  beaten  down  and  deeply  furrowed  these  mounds, 
while  the  grass  has  crept  over  them  and  made  green  alike  the 
palaces  of  the  kings  and  the  temples  of  the  gods.1 

1  Lying  upon  the  left  bank  of  the  Upper  Tigris  are  two  enormous  mounds 
surrounded  by  heavy  earthen  ramparts,  about  eight  miles  in  circuit.  This  is 
the  site  of  ancient  Nineveh,  the  immense  enclosing  ridges  being  the  ruined  city 
walls.     These  ramparts  are  still,  in  their  crumbled  condition,  about  fifty  feet 


PALACE-MOUNDS  AND  PALACES. 


55 


Palace-Mounds  and  Palaces.  —  In  order  to  give  a  certain  dig- 
nity to  the  royal  residence,  to  secure  the  fresh  breezes,  and  to  ren- 
der them  more  easily  defended,  the  Assyrians,  as  well  as  the  Baby- 
lonians and  the  Persians,  built  their  palaces  upon  lofty  artificial 
terraces,  or  platforms.  These  eminences,  which  appear  like  natural, 
flat-topped  hills,  were  constructed  with  an  almost  incredible  expen- 
diture of  human  labor.  The  great  palace-mound  at  Nineveh,  called 
by  the  natives  Koyunjik,  covers  an  area  of  one  hundred  acres,  and 


RESTORATION  OF  A  COURT  IN  SARGON'S  PALACE  AT  KHORSABAD. 
(After  Fergusson.) 

is  from  seventy  to  ninety  feet  high.  Out  of  the  material  compos- 
ing it  could  be  built  four  pyramids  as  large  as  that  of  Cheops. 
Upon  this  mound  stood  several  of  the  most  splendid  palaces  of 
the  Ninevite  kings. 

The   group  of  buildings   constituting  the  royal   residence  was 

high,  and  average  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  in  width.  The  lower  part  of 
the  wall  was  constructed  of  solid  stone  masonry;  the  upper  portion  of  dried 
brick.  This  upper  and  frailer  part,  crumbling  into  earth,  has  completely  buried 
the  stone  basement.  The  Turks  of  to-day  quarry  the  stone  from  these  old 
walls  for  their  buildings. 


56 


ASSYRIA. 


often  of  enormous  extent ;  the  various  courts,  halls,  corridors,  and 
chambers  of  the  Palace  of  Sennacherib,  which  surmounted  the 
great  platform  at  Nineveh,  covered  an  area  of  over  ten  acres. 
The  palaces  were  usually  one-storied.  The  walls,  constructed  chiefly 
of  dried  brick,  were  immensely  thick  and  heavy.  The  rooms  and 
galleries  were  plastered  with  stucco,  or  panelled  with  precious  woods, 
or  lined  with  enamelled  bricks.  The  main  halls,  however,  and  the 
great  open  courts  were  faced  with  slabs  of  alabaster,  covered  with 
sculptures  and  inscriptions,  the  illustrated  narrative  of  the  wars  and 
labors  of  the  monarch.  There  were  two  miles  of  such  sculptured 
panelling  at  Koyunjik.  At  the  portals  of  the  palace,  to  guard  the 
approach,  were  stationed  the  colossal  human-headed  bulls. 


SCULPTURES    FROM    A   GATEWAY    AT    KHORSABAD. 

An  important  adjunct  of  the  palace  was  the  temple,  a  copy  of 
the  tower-temples  of  the  Chaldseans.  Its  position  is  marked  at 
present  by  a  lofty  conical  mound  rising  amidst  and  overlooking 
the  palace  ruins. 

Upon  the  decay  of  the  Assyrian  palaces,  the  material  forming 
the  upper  part  of  the  thick  walls  completely  buried  and  protected 
all  the  lower  portion  of  the  structure.  In  this  way  their  sculptures 
and  inscriptions  have  been  preserved  through  so  many  centuries, 
till  brought  to  light  by  the  recent  excavations  of  French  and 
English  antiquarians. 


THE  ROYAL  LIBRARY.  57 

The  Royal  Library  at  Nineveh.  —  Within  the  palace  of  Asshur- 
bani-pal  at  Nineveh,  Layard  discovered  what  is  known  as  the 
Royal  Library.  There  were  two  chambers,  the  floors  of  which 
were  heaped  with  books,  like  the  Chaldaean  tablets  already  de- 
scribed. The  number  of  books  in  the  collection  has  been  esti- 
mated at  ten  thousand.  The  writing  upon  some  of  the  tablets  is 
so  minute  that  it  cannot  be  read  without  the  aid  of  a  magnifying 
glass.  We  learn  from  the  inscriptions  that  a  librarian  had  charge 
of  the  collection.  Catalogues  of  the  books  have  been  found,  made 
out  on  clay  tablets.  The  library  was  open  to  the  public,  for  an 
inscription  says,  "  I  [Asshur-bani-pal]  wrote  upon  the  tablets ;  I 
placed  them  in  my  palace  for  the  instruction  of  my  people." 

Asshur-bani-pal,  as  we  have  already  learned,  was  the  Augustus 
of  Assyria.  It  was  under  his  patronage  and  direction  that  most 
of  the  books  were  prepared  and  placed  in  the  Ninevite  collection. 
The  greater  part  of  these  were  copies  of  older  Chaldaean  tablets ; 
for  the  literature  of  the  Assyrians,  as  well  as  their  arts  and  sciences, 
was  borrowed  almost  in  a  body  from  the  Chaldaeans.  All  the  old 
libraries  of  the  low  country  were  ransacked,  and  copies  of  their 
tablets  made  for  the  Royal  Library  at  Nineveh.  Rare  treasures 
were  secured  from  the  libraries  founded  or  enlarged  by  Sargon  of 
Agade  (see  p.  42).  In  this  way  was  preserved  the  most  valuable 
portion  of  the  early  Chaldaean  literature,  which  would  otherwise 
have  been  lost  to  the  world. 

The  tablets  embrace  a  great  variety  of  subjects  ;  the  larger  part, 
however,  are  lexicons  and  treatises  on  grammar,  and  various  other 
works  intended  as  text-books  for  scholars.  Perhaps  the  most 
curious  of  the  tablets  yet  found  are  notes  issued  by  the  govern- 
ment, and  made  redeemable  in  gold  and  silver  on  presentation  at 
the  king's  treasury. 

From  one  part  of  the  library,  which  seems  to  have  been  the 
archives  proper,  were  taken  copies  of  treaties,  reports  of  officers 
of  the  government,  deeds,  wills,  mortgages,  and  contracts.  One 
tablet,  known  as  "  the  Will  of  Sennacherib,"  conveys  to  certain 
priests  some  personal  property  to  be  held  in  trust  for  one  of  his 
sons.     This  is  the  oldest  will  in  existence. 


58  BABYLONIA. 


CHAPTER    V. 

BABYLONIA. 

Babylonian  Affairs  from  1300  to  625  B.C.  —  During  the  six 
centuries  and  more  that  intervened  between  the  conquest  of  the 
old  Chaldaean  monarchy  by  the  Assyrian  king  Tiglathi-Nin  and 
the  successful  revolt  of  the  low  countries  under  Nabopolassar  (see 
pp.  43,  51),  the  Babylonian  peoples  bore  the  Assyrian  yoke  very 
impatiently.  Again  and  again  they  made  violent  efforts  to  throw 
it  off;  and  in  several  instances  they  succeeded,  and  for  a  time 
enjoyed  home  rulers.  But  for  the  most  part  the  whole  country  ae 
far  as  the  "  Sea,"  as  the  Persian  Gulf  is  called  in  the  inscriptions, 
was  a  dependency  of  the  great  overshadowing  empire  of  the  north. 

Nabopolassar  (625-604  b.c).  —  Nabopolassar  was  the  first 
king  of  what  is  called  the  New  Babylonian  Monarchy.  When 
troubles  and  misfortunes  began  to  thicken  about  the  last  Assyrian 
king,  Saracus,  he  intrusted  to  the  care  of  Nabopolassar,  as  his 
viceroy,  the  towns  and  provinces  of  the  South.  The  chance  now 
presented  of  obtaining  a  crown  proved  too  great  a  temptation 
for  the  satrap's  fidelity  to  his  master.  He  revolted  and  became 
independent  (625  B.C.).  Later,  he  entered  into  an  alliance  with 
the  Median  king,  Cyaxares,  against  his  former  sovereign  (see  p. 
51).  Through  the  overthrow  of  Nineveh  and  the  break-up  of 
the  Assyrian  Empire,  the  newvBabylonian  kingdom  received  large 
accessions  of  territory. 

Nebuchadnezzar  (604-561  b.c).  —  Nabopolassar  was  followed 
by  his  renowned  son  Nebuchadnezzar,  whose  oppressive  wars  and 
gigantic  architectural  works  rendered  Babylon  at  once  the  scourge 
and  the  wonder  of  the  ancient  world. 

Jerusalem,  having  repeatedly  revolted,  was  finally  taken  and 
sacked.     The  temple  was  stripped  of  its  sacred  vessels  of  silver 


NABOPOLASSAR.  59 

and  gold,  which  were  carried  away  to  Babylon,  and  the  temple 
itself  with  the  adjoining  palace  was  given  to  the  flames  ;  the  people, 
save  a  miserable  remnant,  were  also  borne  away  into  the  "  Great 
Captivity"  (586  B.C.). 

With  Jerusalem  subdued,  Nebuchadnezzar  pushed  with  all  his 
forces  the  siege  of  the  Phoenician  city  of  Tyre,  whose  investment 
had  been  commenced  several  years  before.  In  striking  language 
the  prophet  Ezekiel  (ch.  xxix.  18)  describes  the  length  and 
hardness  of  the  siege  :  "  Every  head  was  made  bald,  and  every 
shoulder  was  peeled."  After  a  siege  of  thirteen  years,  the  city 
seems  to  have  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  Babylonian  king,  and 
his  authority  was  now  undisputed  from  the  Zagros  Mountains  to 
the  Mediterranean. 

The  numerous  captives  of  his  many  wars,  embracing  peoples  of 
almost  every  nation  in  Western  Asia,  enabled  Nebuchadnezzar  to 
rival  even  the  Pharaohs  in  the  execution  of  enormous  works  re- 
quiring an  immense  expenditure  of  human  labor.  Among  his 
works  were  the  Great  Palace  in  the  royal  quarter  of  the  city ;  the 
celebrated  Hanging  Gardens ;  and  gigantic  reservoirs,  canals,  and 
various  engineering  works,  embracing  a  vast  system  of  irrigation 
that  reached  every  part  of  Babylonia. 

In  addition  to  all  these  works,  the  indefatigable  monarch  seems 
to  have  either  rebuilt  or  repaired  almost  every  city  and  temple 
throughout  the  entire  country.  There  are  said  to  be  at  least  a 
hundred  sites  in  the  tract  immediately  about  Babylon  which  give 
evidence,  by  inscribed  bricks  bearing  his  legend,  of  the  marvellous 
activity  and  energy  of  this  monarch. 

In  the  midst  of  all  these  gigantic  undertakings,  surrounded  by 

a  brilliant  court  of  councillors  and  flatterers,  the  reason  of  the  king 

uddenly  and  mysteriously  clouded.1    After  a  period  the  cloud 

1  "  Nebuchadnezzar  fell  a  victim  to  that  mental  aberration  which  has  often 
proved  the  penalty  of  despotism,  but  in  the  strange  and  degrading  form  to 
which  physicians  have  given  the  name  of  lycanthropy  ;  in  which  the  patient, 
fancying  himself  a  beast,  rejects  clothing  and  ordinary  food,  and  even  (as  in 
this  case)  the  shelter  of  a  roof,  ceases  to  use  articulate  speech,  and  sometimes 
persists  in  going  on  all-fours."  —  Smith's  Ancient  History  of  the  East,  p.  357. 


60  BABYLONIA. 

passed  away,  "  the  glory  of  his  kingdom,  his  honor,  and  bright- 
ness returned  unto  him."  But  it  was  the  splendor  of  the  evening  j 
for  the  old  monarch  soon  after  died  at  the  age  of  eighty,  worn  out 
by  the  toils  and  cares  of  a  reign  of  forty-three  years,  the  longest, 
most  memorable,  and  instructive  in  the  annals  of  the  Babylonian 
or  Assyrian  kings. 

The  Fall  of  Babylon.  —  In  555  b.c,  Nabonadius,  the  last  king 
of  Babylon,  began  his  reign.  He  seems  to  have  associated  with 
himself  in  the  government  his  son  Belshazzar,  who  shared  with  his 
father  the  duties  and  honors  of  royalty,  apparently  on  terms  of 
equal  co-sovereignty. 

To  the  east  of  the  valley  of  the  Tigris  and  the  Euphrates,  beyond 
the  ranges  of  the  Zagros,  there  had  been  growing  up  an  Aryan 
kingdom,  the  Medo- Persian,  which,  at  the  time  now  reached  by 
us,  had  excited  by  its  aggressive  spirit  the  alarm  of  all  the  nations 
of  Western  Asia.  For  purposes  of  mutual  defence,  the  king  of 
Babylon,  and  Croesus,  the  well-known  monarch  of  Lydia,  a  state 
of  Asia  Minor,  formed  an  alliance  against  Cyrus,  the  strong  and 
ambitious  sovereign  of  the  Medes  and  Persians.  This  league 
awakened  the  resentment  of  Cyrus,  and,  after  punishing  Croesus 
and  depriving  him  of  his  kingdom  (see  p.  75),  he  collected  his 
forces  to  chastise  the  Babylonian  king. 

Anticipating  the  attack,  Nabonadius  had  strengthened  the  de- 
fences of  Babylon,  and  stationed  around  it  supporting  armies.  But 
he  was  able  to  avert  the  fatal  blow  for  only  a  few  years.  Risking 
a  battle  in  the  open  field,  his  army  was  defeated,  and  the  gates  of 
the  capital  were  thrown  open  to  the  Persians  (538  B.C.).1 

With  the  fall  of  Babylon,  the  sceptre  of  dominion,  borne  for  so 
many  years  by  Semitic  princes,  was  given  into  the  hands  of  the 
Aryan  peoples,  who  were  destined,  from  this  time  forward,  to 
shape  the  course  of  events,  and  control  the  affairs  of  civilization. 

1  The  device  of  turning  the  Euphrates,  which  Herodotus  makes  an  incident 
of  the  siege,  was  not  resorted  to  by  Cyrus;  but  it  seems  that  a  little  later  (in 
521-519  B.C.),  the  city,  having  revolted,  was  actually  taken  in  this  way  by  the 
Persian  king  Darius.     Herodotus  confused  the  two  events. 


GREAT  EDIFICES. 


61 


The  Great  Edifices  of  Babylon.  —  The  deep  impression  which 
Babylon  produced  upon  the  early  Greek  travellers  was  made 
chiefly  by  her  vast  architectural  works,  —  her  temples,  palaces, 
elevated  gardens,  and  great  walls.  The  Hanging  Gardens  of  Neb- 
uchadnezzar and  the  walls  of  the  city  were  reckoned  among  the 
wonders  of  the  world. 

The  Babylonians,  like  their  predecessors  the  Chaldaeans,  ac- 
corded to  the  sacred  edifice  the  place  of  pre-eminence  among 
their  architec- 
tural works. 
Sacred  archi- 
tecture in  the 
time  of  Neb- 
uchadnezzar 
had  changed 
but  little  from 
the  early  Chal- 
daean  models 
(see  p.  44)  ; 
save  that  the 
temples  were 
now  larger  and 
more  splen- 
did,     being 

made,  in  the  language  of  the  inscriptions,  "  to  shine  like  the 
sun."  The  celebrated  Temple  of  the  Seven  Spheres,  at  Bor- 
sippa,  a  suburb  of  Babylon,  may  serve  as  a  representative  of 
the  later  Babylonian  temples.  This  structure  was  a  vast  pyra- 
mid, rising  in  seven  consecutive  stages,  or  platforms,  to  a  height 
of  over  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet.  Each  of  the  stages  was 
dedicated  to  one  of  the  seven  planets,  or  spheres.  (The  sun 
and  moon  were  reckoned  as  planets.)  The  stages  sacred  to  the 
sun  and  moon  were  covered  respectively  with  plates  of  gold  and 
silver.  The  chapel,  or  shrine  proper,  surmounted  the  uppermost 
stage.     An  inscribed  cylinder  discovered  under  the  corner  of  one 


BIRS-NIMRUD. 


(Ruins  of  the  great  Temple  of  the  Seven  Spheres, 
near  Babylon.) 


62  BABYLONIA. 

of  the  stages  (the  Babylonians  always  buried  records  beneath  the 
corners  of  their  public  edifices),  informs  us  that  this  temple  was 
a  restoration  by  Nebuchadnezzar  of  a  very  ancient  one,  which  in 
his  day  had  become,  from  "  extreme  old  age,"  a  heap  of  rubbish. 
This  edifice  in  its  decay  has  left  one  of  the  grandest  and  most 
impressive  ruins  in  all  the  East. 

The  Babylonian  palaces  and  palace-mounds,  in  all  essential 
features,  were  like  those  of  the  Assyrians,  already  described. 

The  so-called  Hanging  Gardens  excited  the  greatest  admiration 
of  the  ancient  Greek  visitors  to  Babylon.  They  were  constructed 
by  Nebuchadnezzar,  to  please  his  wife  Amytis,  who,  tired  of  the 
monotony  of  the  Babylonian  plains,  longed  for  the  mountain 
scenery  of  her  native  Media.  The  gardens  were  probably  built 
somewhat  in  the  form  of  the  tower-temples,  the  successive  stages 
being  covered  with  earth,  and  beautified  with  rare  plants  and 
trees,  so  as  to  simulate  the  appearance  of  a  mountain  rising  in 
cultivated  terraces  towards  the  sky. 

Under  the  later  kings,  Babylon  was  surrounded  with  stupendous 
walls.  Herodotus  affirms  that  these  defences  enclosed  an  area 
just  fourteen  miles  square.  A  recently  discovered  inscription 
corroborates  the  statement  of  the  historian.  The  object  in  enclos- 
ing such  an  enormous  district  seems  to  have  been  to  bring  sufficient 
arable  ground  within  the  defences  to  support  the  inhabitants  in 
case  of  a  protracted  siege.  No  certain  traces  of  these  great  ram- 
parts can  now  be  found. 


THE  PATRIARCHAL  AGE.  63 


CHAPTER   VI. 

THE   HEBREWS. 

The  Patriarchal  Age.  —  Hebrew  history  begins  with  the  depart- 
ure of  Abraham  out  of  Ur  of  the  Chaldees,  about  2000  B.C.  The 
story  of  Abraham  and  his  nephew  Lot,  of  Isaac  and  his  sons  Jacob 
and  Esau,  of  the  sojourn  of  the  descendants  of  Jacob  in  Egypt,  of 
the  Exodus,  of  the  conquest  of  Canaan  and  the  apportionment  of 
the  land  among  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  —  all  this  marvellous 
story  is  told  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  with  a  charm  and  simplicity 
that  have  made  it  the  familiar  possession  of  childhood. 

The  Judges  (from  about  1300  to  1095  B.C.).  —  Along  period 
of  anarchy  and  dissension  followed  the  conquest  and  settlement  of 
Canaan  by  the  Hebrews.  "  There  was  no  king  in  Israel :  every 
man  did  that  which  was  right  in  his  own  eyes."  During  this  time 
there  arose  a  line  of  national  heroes,  such  as  Gideon,  Jephthah, 
and  Samson,  whose  deeds  of  valor  and  daring,  and  the  timely 
deliverance  they  wrought  for  the  tribes  of  Israel  from  their  foes, 
( aused  their  names  to  be  handed  down  with  grateful  remembrance 
to  following  ages. 

These  popular  leaders  were  called  Judges  because  they  usually 
exercised  judicial  functions,  acting  as  arbiters  between  the  different 
tribes,  as  well  as  between  man  and  man.  Their  exploits  are  nar- 
rated in  the  Book  of  Judges,  which  is  a  collection  of  the  fragmen- 
tary, yet  always  interesting,  traditions  of  this  early  and  heroic  period 
of  the  nation's  life.  The  last  of  the  Judges  was  Samuel,  whose  life 
embraces  the  close  of  the  anarchical  age  and  the  beginning  of  the 
monarchy. 

Founding  of  the  Hebrew  Monarchy  (about  1095  B.C.). —  Dur- 
ing tin-  period  of  the  Judges,  the  tribes  of  Israel  were  united  by  no 
central  government.     Their  union  was  nothing  more  than  a  league, 


64  THE  HEBREWS. 

or  confederation,  which  has  been  compared  to  the  Saxon  Hep- 
tarchy in  England.  But  the  common  dangers  to  which  they  were 
exposed  from  the  attacks  of  the  half-subdued  Canaanitish  tribes 
about  them,  and  the  example  of  the  great  kingdoms  of  Egypt  and 
Assyria,  led  the  people  to  begin  to  think  of  the  advantages  of  a 
closer  union  and  a  stronger  government.  Consequently  the  repub- 
lic, or  confederation,  was  changed  into  a  kingdom,  and  Saul,  of 
the  tribe  of  Benjamin,  a  man  chosen  in  part  because  of  his  com- 
manding stature  and  royal  aspect,  was  made  king  of  the  new 
monarchy  (about  1095  B.C.). 

The  king  was  successful  in  subduing  the  enemies  of  the  Hebrews, 
and  consolidated  the  tribes  and  settled  the  affairs  of  the  new  state. 
But  towards  the  close  of  his  reign,  his  reason  became  disturbed : 
fits  of  gloom  and  despondency  passed  into  actual  insanity,  which 
clouded  the  closing  years  of  his  life.  At  last  he  and  his  three 
sons  fell  in  battle  with  the  Philistines  upon  Mount  Gilboa  (about 
1055  B.C.). 

The  Reign  of  David  (about  1 055-101 5  b.c).  —  Upon  the  death 
of  Saul,  David,  son  of  Jesse,  of  the  tribe  of  Judah,  who  had  been 
previously  anointed  and  encouraged  to  expect  the  crown  by  the 
high-priest  Samuel,  assumed  the  sceptre.  This  warlike  king  trans- 
formed the  pastoral  and  half-civilized  tribes  into  a  conquering 
people,  and,  in  imitation  of  the  monarchs  of  the  Nile  and  the 
Euphrates,  extended  the  limits  of  his  empire  in  every  direction, 
and  waged  wars  of  extermination  against  the  troublesome  tribes 
of  Moab  and  Edom. 

Poet  as  well  as  warrior,  David  enriched  the  literature  of  his  own 
nation  and  of  the  world  with  lyric  songs  that  breathe  such  a  spirit 
of  devotion  and  trust  that  they  have  been  ever  since  his  day  the 
source  of  comfort  and  inspiration  to  thousands.1  He  had  in  mind 
to  build  at  Jerusalem,  his  capital  city,  a  magnificent  temple,  and 
spent  the  latter  years  of  his  life  in  collecting  material  for  this  pur- 

1  The  authorship  of  the  different  psalms  is  a  matter  of  debate,  yet  critics 
are  very  nearly  agreed  in  ascribing  the  composition  of  at  least  a  considerable 
number  of  them  to  David. 


THE  REIGN  OF  SOLOMON. 


65 


pose.  In  dying,  he  left  the  crown  to  Solomon,  his  youngest  son, 
his  eldest,  Absalom,  having  been  slain  in  a  revolt  against  his  father, 
and  the  second,  Adonijah,  having  been  excluded  from  the  succes- 
sion for  a  similar  crime. 

The  Reign  of  Solomon  (about  1015-975  B.C.).  —  Solomon  did 
not  possess  his  father's  talent  for  military  affairs,  but  was  a  liberal 
patron  of  architecture,  commerce,  and  learning.  He  erected, 
with  the  utmost  magnificence  of  adornment,  the  temple  at  Jeru- 
salem, planned  by  his  father  David.     King  Hiram  of  Tyre,  who 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  SOLOMON.     (A  Restoration.) 

was  a  close  friend  of  the  Hebrew  monarch,  aided  him  in  this  un- 
dertaking by  supplying  him  with  the  celebrated  cedar  of  Lebanon, 
and  with  Tynan  architects,  the  most  skilled  workmen  at  that  time 
in  the  world.  The  dedication  ceremonies  upon  the  completion  of 
the  building  were  most  imposing  and  impressive.  Thenceforth 
this  temple  was  the  centre  of  the  Jewish  worship  and  of  the 
national  life. 

For  the  purpose  of  extending  his  commerce,  Solomon  built  fleets 
upon  the  Mediterranean  and  the  Red  Sea.  The  most  remote 
regions  of  Asia  and  Africa  were  visited  by  his  ships,  and  their  rich 
and  wonderful  products  made  to  contribute  to  the  wealth  and  glory 
of  his  kingdom. 


66  THE  HEBREWS. 

Solomon  maintained  one  of  the  most  magnificent  courts  ever 
held  by  an  oriental  sovereign.  When  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  attracted 
by  the  reports  of  his  glory,  came  from  Southern  Arabia  to  visit  the 
monarch,  she  exclaimed,  "  The  half  was  not  told  me."  He  was 
the  wisest  king  of  the  East.  His  proverbs  are  famous  specimens 
of  sententious  wisdom.  He  was  versed,  too,  in  botany,  being 
acquainted  with  plants  and  trees  "  from  the  hyssop  upon  the  wall 
to  the  cedar  of  Lebanon." 

But  wise  as  was  Solomon  in  his  words,  his  life  was  far  from 
being  either  admirable  or  prudent.  In  conformity  with  Asiatic 
custom,  he  had  many  wives  —  seven  hundred,  we  are  told  —  of 
different  nationalities  and  religions.  Through  their  persuasion  the 
old  monarch  himself  fell  into  idolatry,  which  turned  from  him 
the  affections  of  his  best  subjects,  and  prepared  the  way  for  the 
dissensions  and  wars  that  followed  his  death. 

The  Division  of  the  Kingdom  (about  975  b.c).  —  The  reign 
of  Solomon  was  brilliant,  yet  disastrous  in  the  end  to  the  Hebrew 
monarchy.  In  order  to  carry  on  his  vast  undertakings,  he  had 
laid  most  oppressive  taxes  upon  his  people.  When  Rehoboam, 
his  son,  succeeded  to  his  father's  place,  the  people  entreated  him 
to  lighten  the  taxes  that  were  making  their  very  lives  a  burden. 
Influenced  by  young  and  unwise  counsellors,  he  replied  to  the 
petition  with  haste  and  insolence  :  "  My  father,"  said  he,  "  chas- 
tised you  with  whips,  but  I  will  chastise  you  with  scorpions." 
Immediately  all  the  tribes,  save  Judah  and  Benjamin,  rose  in 
revolt,  and  succeeded  in  setting  up,  to  the  north  of  Jerusalem, 
a  rival  kingdom,  with  Jeroboam  as  its  first  king.  This  northern 
state,  with  Samaria  as  its  capital,  became  known  as  the  Kingdom 
of  Israel ;  the  southern,  of  which  Jerusalem  remained  the  capital, 
was  called  the  Kingdom  of  Judah. 

Thus  was  torn  in  twain  the  empire  of  David  and  Solomon. 
United,  the  tribes  might  have  maintained  an  empire  capable  of 
offering  successful  resistance  to  the  encroachments  of  the  powerful 
and  ambitious  monarchs  about  them.  But  now  the  land  becomes 
an  easy  prey  to  the  spoiler.     It  is  henceforth  the  pathway  of  the 


THE   KINGDOM  OF  ISRAEL.  67 

conquering  armies  of  the  Nile  and  the  Euphrates.  Between  the 
powerful  monarchies  of  these  regions,  as  between  an  upper  and 
nether  millstone,  the  little  kingdoms  are  destined,  one  after  the 
other,  to  be  ground  to  pieces. 

The  Kingdom  of  Israel  (9757-722  b.c).  —  The  kingdom  of 
the  Ten  Tribes  maintained  an  existence  for  about  two  hundred 
and  fifty  years.  Its  story  is  instructive  and  sad.  Many  passages 
of  its  history  are  recitals  of  the  struggles  between  the  pure  worship 
of  Jehovah  and  the  idolatrous  service  of  the  deities  introduced 
from  the  surrounding  nations.  The  cause  of  the  religion  of  Jeho- 
vah, as  the  tribes  of  Israel  had  received  it  from  the  patriarch 
Abraham  and  the  lawgiver  Moses,  was  boldly  espoused  and  upheld 
by  a  line  of  the  most  remarkable  teachers  and  prophets  produced 
by  the  Hebrew  race,  among  whom  Elijah  and  Elisha  stand  pre- 
eminent. 

The  little  kingdom  was  at  last  overwhelmed  by  the  Assyrian 
power.  This  happened  722  B.C.,  when  Samaria,  as  we  have 
already  narrated  in  the  history  of  Assyria,  was  captured  by  Sargon, 
king  of  Nineveh,  and  the  Ten  Tribes  were  carried  away  into  cap- 
tivity beyond  the  Euphrates  (see  p.  48).  From  this  time  they 
are  quite  lost  to  history. 

The  country,  left  nearly  vacant  by  this  wholesale  deportation 
of  its  inhabitants,  was  filled  with  other  subjects  or  captives  of  the 
Assyrian  king.  The  descendants  of  these,  mingled  with  the  few 
Jews  of  the  poorer  class  that  were  still  left  in  the  country,  formed 
the  Samaritans  of  the  time  of  Christ. 

The  Kingdom  of  Judah  (975 ?-586  b.c).  — This  little  king- 
dom, torn  by  internal  religious  dissensions,  as  was  its  rival  kingdom 
of  the  north,  and  often  on  the  very  verge  of  ruin  from  Egyptian  or 
Assyrian  armies,  maintained  an  independent  existence  for  about 
four  centuries.  During  this  period,  a  line  of  eighteen  kings,  of 
most  diverse  character,  sat  upon  the  throne.  Upon  the  exten- 
sion of  the  power  of  Babylon  to  the  west,  Jerusalem  was  forced  to 
acknowledge  the  suzerainty  of  the  Babylonian  kings. 

The  kingdom  at  last  shared  the  fate  of  its  northern  rival.     Neb- 


68  THE  HEBREWS. 

uchadnezzar,  in  revenge  for  an  uprising  of  the  Jews,  besieged 
and  captured  Jerusalem,  and  carried  away  a  large  part  of  the 
people,  and  their  king  Zedekiah,  into  captivity  at  Babylon  (see  p. 
58).  This  event  virtually  ended  the  separate  and  political  life  of 
the  Hebrew  race  (586  B.C.).  Henceforth  Judah  constituted 
simply  a  province  of  the  empires  —  Babylonian,  Persian,  Mace- 
donian, and  Roman  —  which  successively  held  sway  over  the 
regions  of  Western  Asia,  with,  however,  just  one  flicker  of  national 
life  under  the  Maccabees,  during  a  part  of  the  two  centuries  pre- 
ceding the  birth  of  Christ. 

It  only  remains  to  mention  those  succeeding  events  which  be- 
long rather  to  the  story  of  the  Jews  as  a  people  than  as  a  nation. 
Upon  the  capture  of  Babylon  by  the  Persian  king  Cyrus  (see  p. 
60),  that  monarch,  who  was  kindly  disposed  towards  the  Jews  that 
he  there  found  captives,  permitted  them  to  return  to  Jerusalem 
and  restore  the  temple.  Jerusalem  thus  became  again  the  centre 
of  the  old  Hebrew  worship,  and,  although  shorn  of  national .  glory, 
continued  to  be  the  sacred  centre  of  the  ancient  faith  till  the 
second  generation  after  Christ.  Then,  in  chastisement  for  re- 
peated revolts,  the  city  was  laid  in  ruins  by  the  Romans ;  while 
vast  numbers  of  the  inhabitants  —  some  authorities  say  over  one 
million  —  were  slain,  or  perished  by  famine,  and  the  remnant  were 
driven  into  exile  to  different  lands. 

Thus,  by  a  series  of  unparalleled  calamities  and  persecutions, 
the  descendants  of  Abraham  were  "  sifted  among  all  nations  " ; 
but  to  this  day  they  cling  with  a  strange  devotion  and  loyalty  to 
the  simple  faith  of  their  fathers. 

Hebrew  Religion  and  Literature. 

The  ancient  Hebrews  made  little  or  no  contribution  to  science. 
They  produced  no  new  order  of  architecture.  In  sculpture  they 
did  nothing :  their  religion  forbade  their  making  "graven  images." 
Their  mission  was  to  teach  religion.  Here  they  have  been  the 
instructors  of  the  world.     Their  literature  is  a  religious  one ;  for 


RELIGION  AND  LITERATURE.  69 

literature  with  them  was  simply  a  medium  for  the  conveyance  of 
religious  instruction  and  the  awakening  of  devotional  feeling. 

The  Hebrew  religion,  a  pure  monotheism,  the  teachings  of  a 
long  line  of  holy  men  —  patriarchs,  lawgivers,  prophets,  and  priests 
—  stretching  from  Abraham  down  to  the  fifth  century  B.C.,  is  con- 
tained in  the  sacred  books  of  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures.  In 
these  ancient  writings,  patriarchal  traditions,  histories,  dramas, 
poems,  prophecies,  and  personal  narratives  blend  in  a  wonderful 
mosaic,  which  pictures  with  vivid  and  grand  effect  the  various 
migrations,  the  deliverances,  the  calamities  —  all  the  events  and 
religious  experiences  in  the  checkered  life  of  the  Chosen  People. 

Out  of  this  old  exclusive,  formal  Hebrew  religion,  transformed 
and  spiritualized  by  the  Great  Teacher,  grew  the  Christian  faith. 
Out  of  the  Old  Testament  arose  the  New,  which  we  should  think 
of  as  a  part  of  Hebrew  literature  :  for  although  written  in  the 
Greek  language,  and  long  after  the  close  of  the  political  life  of  the 
Jewish  nation,  still  it  is  essentially  Hebrew  in  thought  and  doc- 
trine, and  the  supplement  and  crown  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures. 

Besides  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  called  collectively,  by  way  of 
pre-eminence,  the  Bible  (The  Book),  it  remains  to  mention  espe- 
cially the  Apocrypha,  embracing  a  number  of  books  that  were 
composed  after  the  decline  of  the  prophetic  spirit,  and  which 
show  traces,  as  indeed  do  several  of  the  later  books  of  the  Bible, 
of  the  influence  of  Persian  and  Greek  thought.  These  books  are 
generally  regarded  by  the  Jews  and  Protestants  as  uncanonical, 
but  in  the  main  are  considered  by  the  Roman  Catholics  as  pos- 
sessing equal  authority  with  the  other  books  of  the  Bible. 

Neither  should  we  fail  to  mention  the  Talmud,  a  collection  of 
Hebrew  customs  and  traditions,  with  the  comments  thereupon  of 
the  rabbis,  a  work  held  by  most  Jews  next  in  sacredness  to  the 
Holy  Book  ;  the  writings  of  Philo,  an  illustrious  rabbi  who  lived  at 
Alexandria  just  before  the  birth  of  Christ ;  and  the  Antiquities  of 
the  Jews  and  the  Jewish  Wars  by  the  historian  Josephus,  who 
lived  and  wrote  about  the  time  of  the  taking  of  Jerusalem  by 
Titus ;  that  is,  during  the  latter  part  of  the  first  century  after  Christ. 


70  THE  PHCENICIANS. 


CHAPTER   VII. 

THE   PHCENICIANS. 

The  Land  and  the  People.  —  Ancient  Phoenicia  embraced  a 
little  strip  of  broken  sea-coast  lying  between  the  Mediterranean 
and  the  ranges  of  Mount  Lebanon.  One  of  the  most  noted  pro- 
ductions of  the  country  was  the  fine  fir-timber  cut  from  the  forests 
that  crowned  the  lofty  ranges  of  the  Lebanon  Mountains.  The 
"  cedar  of  Lebanon  "  holds  a  prominent  place  both  in  the  history 
and  the  poetry  of  the  East. 

Another  celebrated  product  of  the  country  was  the  Tyrian 
purple,  which  was  obtained  from  several  varieties  of  the  murex,  a 
species  of  shell-fish,  secured  at  first  along  the  Phoenician  coast, 
but  later  sought  in  distant  waters,  especially  in  the  Grecian  seas. 

The  Phoenicians  were  of  Semitic  race,  and  of  close  kin  to  most 
of  the  so-called  Canaanitish  tribes.  They  were  a  maritime  and 
trading  people. 

Tyre  and  Sidon.  — The  various  Phoenician  cities  never  coalesced 
to  form  a  true  nation.  They  simply  constituted  a  sort  of  league, 
or  confederacy,  the  petty  states  of  which  generally  acknowledged 
the  leadership  of  Tyre  or  of  Sidon,  the  two  chief  cities.  The 
place  of  supremacy  in  the  confederation  was  at  first  held  by  Sidon, 
but  later  by  Tyre. 

FYom-the  nth  to  the  4th  century  B.C.,  Tyre  controlled,  almost 
without  dispute  on  the  part  of  Sidon,  the  affairs  of  Phoenicia. 
During  this  time  the  maritime  enterprise  and  energy  of  her  mer- 
chants spread  the  fame  of  the  little  island-capital  throughout 
the  world.     She  was  queen  and  mistress  of  the  Mediterranean. 

During  all  the  last  centuries  of  her  existence,  Phoenicia  was,  for 
the  most  part,  tributary  to  one  or  another  of  the  great  monarchies 
about  her.     She  acknowledged  in  turn  the  suzerainty  of  the  Assyr- 


PHCENICIAN  COMMERCE.  71 

ian,  the  Egyptian,  the  Babylonian,  the  Persian,  and  the  Macedo- 
nian kings.  Alexander  the  Great,  after  a  most  memorable  siege, 
captured  the  city  of  Tyre  —  which  alone  of  all  the  Phoenician 
cities  closed  her  gates  against  the  conqueror  —  and  reduced  it  to 
ruins  (332  B.C.).  The  city  never  recovered  from  this  blow.  The 
site  of  the  once  brilliant  maritime  capital  is  now  "  bare  as  the  top 
of  a  rock,"  a  place  where  the  few  fishermen  that  still  frequent  the 
spot  spread  their  nets  to  dry. 

Phoenician  Commerce.  —  When  we  catch  our  first  glimpse  of 
the  Mediterranean,  about  1500  B.C.,  it  is  dotted  with  the  sails  of 
Phoenician  navigators.  It  was  natural  that  the  people  of  the  Phoe- 
nician coast  should  have  been  led  to  a  seafaring  life.  The  lofty 
mountains  that  back  the  little  strip  of  shore  seemed  to  shut  them 
out  from  a  career  of  conquest  and  to  prohibit  an  extension  of  their 
land  domains.  At  the  same  time,  the  Mediterranean  in  front  in- 
vited them  to  maritime  enterprise ;  while  the  forests  of  Lebanon 
in  the  rear  offered  timber  in  abundance  for  their  ships.  The 
Phoenicians,  indeed,  were  the  first  navigators  who  pushed  out 
boldly  from  the  shore  and  made  real  sea  voyages. 

The  longest  voyages  were  made  to  procure  tin,  which  was  in 
great  demand  for  the  manufacture  of  articles  in  bronze.  The 
nearest  region  where  this  metal  was  found  was  the  Caucasus,  on 
the  eastern  shore  of  the  Euxine.  The  Phoenician  sailors  boldly 
threaded  the  yEgean  Archipelago,  passed  through  the  Hellespont, 
braved  the  unknown  terrors  of  the  Black  Sea,  and  from  the  land 
of  Colchis  brought  back  to  the  manufacturers  of  Asia  the  coveted 
article. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  nth  century  B.C.,  the  jealousy  of  the 
Pelasgic  states  of  Greece  and  of  the  Archipelago,  that  were  now 
growing  into  maritime  power,  closed  the  ^£gean  Sea  against  the 
Phuunician  navigators.  They  then  pushed  out  into  the  Western 
Mediterranean,  and  opened  the  tin-mines  of  the  Iberian  (Spanish) 
peninsula.  When  these  began  to  fail,  these  bold  sailors  passed  the 
Pillars  of  Hercules,  faced  the  dangers  of  the  Atlantic,  and  brought 
back  from  those  distant  seas  the  tin  gathered  in  the  mines  of 
Britain. 


72  THE  PHCENICIANS. 

Phoenician  Colonies. — Along  the  different  routes  pursued  by 
their  ships,  and  upon  the  coasts  visited  by  them,  the  Phoenicians 
established  naval  stations  and  trading-posts.  Settlements  were 
founded  in  Lesbos,  Rhodes,  and  other  islands  of  the  yEgean  Sea, 
as  well  as  in  Greece  itself.  The  shores  of  Sicily,  Sardinia,  and 
Corsica  were  fringed  with  colonies  ;  while  the  coast  of  North  Africa 
was  dotted  with  such  great  cities  as  Utica,  Hippo,  and  Carthage. 
Colonies  were  even  planted  beyond  the  Pillars  of  Hercules,  upon 
the  Atlantic  seaboard.  The  Phoenician  settlement  of  Gades,  upon 
the  western  coast  of  Spain,  is  still  preserved  in  the  modern  Cadiz. 

Arts  disseminated  by  the  Phoenicians.  —  We  can  scarcely  over- 
rate the  influence  of  Phoenician  maritime  enterprise  upon  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  arts  and  the  spread  of  culture  among  the  early 
peoples  of  the  Mediterranean  area.  "  Egypt  and  Assyria,"  says 
Lenormant,  "  were  the  birthplace  of  material  civilization ;  the 
Canaanites  [Phoenicians]  were  its  missionaries."  Most  prominent 
of  the  arts  which  they  introduced  among  all  the  nations  with  whom 
they  traded  was  that  of  alphabetical  writing. 

Before  or  during  the  rule  of  the  Hyksos  in  Egypt,  the  Phoe- 
nician settlers  in  the  Delta  borrowed  from  the  Egyptians  twenty- 
two  hieratic  characters,  which  they  passed  on  to  their  Asiatic 
kinsmen.  These  characters  received  new  names,  and  became  the 
Phoenician  alphabet.  Now,  wherever  the  Phoenicians  went,  they 
carried  this  alphabet  as  "one  of  their  exports."  It  was  through 
them,  probably,  that  the  Greeks  received  it ;  the  Greeks  passed  it 
on  to  the  Romans,  and  the  Romans  gave  it  to  the  German  peoples. 
In  this  way  did  our  alphabet  come  to  us  from  Old  Egypt. 

The  introduction  of  letters  among  the  different  nations,  vast  as 
was  the  benefit  which  the  gift  conferred  upon  peoples  just  begin- 
ning to  make  advances  in  civilization,  was  only  one  of  the  many 
advantages  which  resulted  to  the  early  civilization  of  Europe  from 
the  commercial  enterprise  of  the  Phoenicians.  It  is  probable  that 
they  first  introduced  among  the  semi-civilized  tribes  of  that  conti- 
nent the  use  of  bronze,  which  marks  an  epoch  in  their  growing 
culture.     Articles   of  Phoenician  workmanship   are   found   in  the 


GREAT  ENTERPRISES.  73 

earliest  tombs  of  the  Greeks,  the  Etruscans,  and  the  Romans  j  and 
in  very  many  of  the  manufactures  of  these  peoples  may  be  traced 
the  influence  of  Phoenician  art. 

Great  Enterprises  aided  by  the  Phoenicians.  —  While  scatter- 
ing the  germs  of  civilization  and  culture  broadcast  over  the  entire 
Mediterranean  area,  the  enterprising  Phoenicians  were  also  lending 
aid  to  almost  every  great  undertaking  of  antiquity. 

King  Hiram  of  Tyre  furnished  Solomon  with  artisans  and  skilled 
workmen,  and  with  great  rafts  of  timber  from  Lebanon,  for  build- 
ing the  splendid  temple  at  Jerusalem.  The  Phoenicians  also  pro- 
vided timber  from  their  fine  forests  for  the  construction  of  the  great 
palaces  and  temples  of  the  Assyrians,  the  Babylonians,  and  the 
Egyptians.  They  built  for  the  Persian  king  Xerxes  the  Hellespon- 
tine  bridges  over  which  he  marched  his  immense  army  into  Greece 
(see  p.  81).  They  furnished  contingents  of  ships  to  the  kings  of 
Nineveh  and  Babylon  for  naval  operations  both  upon  the  Mediter- 
ranean and  the  Persian  and  Arabian  gulfs.  Their  fleets  served  as 
transports  and  convoys  to  the  expeditions  of  the  Persian  monarchs 
aiming  at  conquest  in  Asia  Minor  or  in  Europe.  They  formed,  too, 
the  naval  branch  of  the  armaments  of  the  Pharaohs  ;  for  the  Egyp- 
tians hated  the  sea,  and  never  had  a  native  fleet.  And  it  was 
Phoenician  sailors  that,  under  the  orders  of  Pharaoh-Necho,  cir- 
cumnavigated Africa  (see  p.  26)  — an  undertaking  which,  although 
attended  perhaps  with  less  advantage  to  the  world,  still  is  reckoned 
quite  as  remarkable,  considering  the  remote  age  in  which  it  was 
accomplished,  as  the  circumnavigation  of  the  globe  by  the  Portu- 
guese navigator  Magellan,  more  than  two  thousand  years  later. 


74  THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

THE   PERSIAN   EMPIRE, 
i.   Political  History. 

Kinship  of  the  Medes  and  Persians.  —  It  was  in  very  remote 
times,  that  some  Aryan  tribes,  separating  themselves  from  the  other 
members  of  the  Aryan  family,  sought  new  abodes  on  the  plateau 
of  Iran.  The  tribes  that  settled  in  the  south  became  known  as 
the  Persians;  while  those  that  took  possession  of  the  mountain 
regions  of  the  northwest  were  called  Medes.  The  Medes,  through 
mingling  with  native  non- Aryan  tribes,  became  quite  different  from 
the  Persians ;  but  notwithstanding  this,  the  names  of  the  two  peo- 
ples were  always  very  closely  associated,  as  in  the  familiar  legend, 
"  The  law  of  the  Medes  and  Persians,  which  altereth  not." 

The  Medes  at  first  the  Leading  Race.  — Although  the  Persians 
were  destined  to  become  the  dominant  tribe  of  all  the  Iranian 
Aryans,  still  the  Medes  were  at  first  the  leading  people.  Cyaxares 
(625-585  B.C.)  was  their  first  prominent  leader  and  king.  We 
have  already  seen  how,  aided  by  the  Babylonians,  he  overthrew 
the  last  king  of  Nineveh,  and  burned  that  capital  (see  p.  51). 

Cyaxares  was  followed  by  his  son  Astyages  (585-558  B.C.),  dur- 
ing whose  reign  the  Persians,  whom  Cyaxares  had  brought  into  at 
least  partial  subjection  to  the  Median  crown,  revolted,  overthrew 
the  Median  power,  and  thenceforth  held  the  place  of  leadership 
and  authority. 

Reign  of  Cyrns  the  Great  (558-529  b.c).  —  The  leader  of  the 
revolt  against  the  Medes  was  Cyrus,  the  tributary  king  of  the  Per- 
sians. Through  his  energy  and  soldierly  genius,  he  soon  built  up 
an  empire  more  extended  than  any  over  which  the  sceptre  had  yet 
been  swayed  by  an  Oriental  monarch,  or  indeed,  so  far  as  we  know, 


REIGN  OF  CYRUS.  75 

by  any  ruler  before  his  time.  It  stretched  from  the  Indus  to  the 
farthest  limits  of  Asia  Minor,  and  from  the  Caspian  Sea  to  the 
Persian  Gulf,  thus  embracing  not  only  the  territories  of  the  Median 
kingdom,  but  also  those  of  the  allied  kingdoms  of  Lydia  and 
Babylonia.  The  subjugation  of  Babylonia  to  the  Persian  authority 
has  already  been  narrated  (see  p.  60).  We  will  now  tell  how  Cyrus 
gained  the  kingdom  of  Lydia. 

Lydia  was  a  country  in  the  western  part  of  Asia  Minor.  It  was 
a  land  highly  favored  by  nature.  It  embraced  two  rich  river  val- 
leys, —  the  plains  of  the  Hermus  and  the  Cayster,  —  which,  from 
the  mountains  inland,  slope  gently  to  the  island-dotted  ^Egean. 
The  Pactolus,  and  other  tributaries  of  the  streams  we  have  named, 
rolled  down  "  golden  sands,"  while  the  mountains  were  rich  in  the 
precious  metals.  The  coast  region  did  not  at  first  belong  to  Lydia ; 
it  was  held  by  the  Greeks,  who  had  fringed  it  with  cities.  The 
capital  of  the  country  was  Sardis,  whose  citadel  was  set  on  a  lofty 
and  precipitous  rock. 

The  Lydians  were  a  mixed  people,  formed,  it  is  thought,  by  the 
mingling,  in  prehistoric  times,  of  Aryan  tribes  that  crossed  the 
^Egean  from  Europe,  with  the  original  non-Aryan  population  of 
the  country. 

The  last  and  most  renowned  of  the  Lydian  kings  was  Croesus. 
Under  him  the  Lydian  empire  attained  its  greatest  extension,  em- 
bracing all  the  states  of  Asia  Minor  west  of  the  Halys,  save  Lycia. 
The  tribute  Croesus  collected  from  the  Greek  cities,  which  he 
subjugated,  and  the  revenues  he  derived  from  his  gold  mines, 
rendered  him  the  richest  monarch  of  his  times,  so  that  his  name 
has  passed  into  the  proverb  "  Rich  as  Croesus." 

Now  Astyages,  whom  Cyrus  had  just  overthrown,  was  the 
brother-in-law  of  this  Croesus.  When  Croesus  heard  of  his  rela- 
tive's misfortune,  he  resolved  to  avenge  his  wrongs.  The  Delphian 
oracle  (see  p.  104),  to  which  he  sent  to  learn  the  issue  of  a  war 
upon  Cyrus,  told  him  that  he  "would  destroy  a  great  kingdom." 
Interpreting  this  favorably,  he  sent  again  to  inquire  whether  the 
empire  he  should  establish  would  prove  permanent,  and  received 


76 


THE   PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 


this  oracle  :  "  Flee  and  tarry  not  when  a  mule  *  shall  be  king  of 
the  Medes."  Deeming  the  accession  of  a  mule  to  the  Persian 
throne  altogether  impossible,  he  inferred  the  oracle  to  mean  that 
his  empire  should  last  forever. 

Thus  encouraged  in  his  purpose,  Croesus  prepared  to  make  war 
upon  Persia.  But  he  had  miscalculated  the  strength  and  activity 
of  his  enemy.  Cyrus  marched  across  the  Halys,  defeated  the 
Lydian  army  in  the  field,  and  after  a  short  siege  captured  Sardis ; 
and  Lydia  became  a  province  of  the  new  Persian  empire. 

There  is  a  story  which  tells  how  Cyrus  had  caused  a  pyre  to  be 
erected  on  which  to  burn   Croesus,  but  at  the  last  moment  was 

struck  by  hear- 
ing the  unfor- 
tunate monarch 
repeatedly  call 
the  name  of 
Solon.  Seeking 
the  meaning  of 
this,  he  was 
told  that  Croe- 
sus in  his  pros- 
perous years 
was  visited  by 
the  Greek  sage 
Solon,  who,  in 
answer   to    the 

inquiry  of  Croesus  as  to  whether  he  did  not  deem  him  a  happy 
man,  replied,  "  Count  no  man  happy  until  he  is  dead."  Cyrus 
was  so  impressed  with  the  story,  so  the  legend  tells,  that  he 
released  the  captive  king,  and  treated  him  with  the  greatest 
kindness. 

This  war  between  Croesus  and  Cyrus  derives  a  special  impor- 
tance from  the  fact  that  it  brought  the  Persian  empire  into  con- 

1  The  allusion  is  to  the  (traditional)  mixed  Persian  and  Median  descent  of 
Cyrus. 


TOMB  OF  CYRUS  THE  GREAT.   (Present  Condition.) 


REIGN  OF  CAMBYSES.  77 

tact  with  the  Greek  cities  of  Asia,  and  thus  led  on  directly  to 
that  memorable  struggle  between  Greece  and  Persia  known  as  the 
Graeco-Persian  War. 

Tradition  says  that  Cyrus  lost  his  life  while  leading  an  expedi- 
tion against  some  Scythian  tribes  in  the  north.  He  was  buried 
at  Pasargadae,  the  old  Persian  capital,  and  there  his  tomb  stands 
to-day,  surrounded  by  the  ruins  of  the  magnificent  buildings  with 
which  he  adorned  that  city.  The  following  cuneiform  inscription 
may  still  be  read  upon  a  pillar  near  the  sepulchre  :  "  I  am  Cyrus, 
the  king,  the  Akhaemenian." 

Cyrus,  notwithstanding  his  seeming  love  for  war  and  conquest, 
possessed  a  kindly  and  generous  disposition.  Almost  universal 
testimony  has  ascribed  to  him  the  purest  and  most  beneficent 
character  of  any  Eastern  monarch. 

Reign  of  Cambyses  (529-522  b.c).  —  Cyrus  the  Great  left  two 
sons,  Cambyses  and  Smerdis  :  the  former,  as  the  oldest,  inherited 
the  sceptre,  and  the  title  of  king.  He  began  a  despotic  and  un- 
fortunate reign  by  causing  his  brother,  whose  influence  he  feared, 
to  be  secretly  put  to  death. 

With  far  less  ability  than  his  father  for  their  execution,  Cambyses 
conceived  even  vaster  projects  of  conquest  and  dominion.  Asia 
had  hitherto  usually  afforded  a  sufficient  field  for  the  ambition  of 
Oriental  despots.  Cambyses  determined  to  add  the  country  of 
Africa  to  the  vast  inheritance  received  from  his  father.  Upon 
some  slight  pretext,  he  invaded  Egypt,  captured  Memphis,  and 
ascended  the  Nile  to  Thebes.  From  here  he  sent  an  army  of 
fifty  thousand  men  to  subdue  the  oasis  of  Ammon,  in  the  Libyan 
desert.  Of  the  vast  host  not  a  man  returned  from  the  expedition. 
It  is  thought  that  the  army  was  overwhelmed  and  buried  by  one 
of  those  fatal  storms,  called  simooms,  that  so  frequently  sweep 
over  those  dreary  wastes  of  sand. 

After  a  short,  unsatisfactory  stay  in  Egypt,  Cambyses  set  out  on 
his  return  to  Persia.  While  on  his  way  home,  news  was  brought 
to  him   that  his  brother  Smerdis  had  usurped  the  throne.      A 


78 


THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 


Magian 1  impostor,  Gomates  by  name,  who  resembled  the  mur- 
dered Smerdis,  had  personated  him,  and  actually  grasped  the 
sceptre.  Entirely  disheartened  by  this  startling  intelligence,  Cam- 
byses  in  despair  took  his  own  life. 

Reign  of  Darius  I.  (521-486  b.c).  —  The  Persian  nobles  soon 
rescued  the  sceptre  from  the  grasp  of  the  false  Smerdis,  and  their 
leader,  Darius,  took  the  throne.  The  first  act  of  Darius  was  to 
punish,  by  a  general  massacre,  the  Magian  priests  for  the  part  they 
had  taken  in  the  usurpation  of  Smerdis. 


CAPTIVE    INSURGENTS    BROUGHT    BEFORE    DARIUS.      Beneath    his  foot  is  the  Magus 
Gomates,  the  false  Smerdis.     (From  the  great  Behistun  Rock.) 

With  quiet  and  submission  secured  throughout  the  empire, 
Darius  gave  himself,  for  a  time,  to  the  arts  of  peace.  He  built  a 
palace  at  Susa,  and  erected  magnificent  structures  at  Persepolis ; 


1  There  were  at  this  time  two  opposing  religions  in  Persia  :  Zoroastrianism, 
which  taught  the  simple  worship  of  God  under  the  name  of  Ormazd;  and 
Magianism,  a  less  pure  faith,  whose  professors  were  fire-worshippers.  The 
former  was  the  religion  of  the  Aryans;  the  latter,  that  of  the  non- Aryan  por- 
tion of  the  population.  The  usurpation  which  placed  Smerdis  on  the  throne 
was  planned  by  the  Magi,  Smerdis  himself  being  a  fire-priest. 


REIGN  OF  DARIUS  I.  79 

reformed  the  administration  of  the  government  (see  p.  82),  mak- 
ing such  wise  and  lasting  changes  that  he  has  been  called  "  the 
second  founder  of  the  Persian  empire  " ;  established  post-roads, 
instituted  a  coinage  for  the  realm,  and  upon  the  great  rock  of 
Behistun,  a  lofty  smooth-faced  cliff  on  the  western  frontier  of 
Persia,  caused  to  be  inscribed  a  record  of  all  his  achievements.1 

And  now  the  Great  King,  Lord  of  Western  Asia  and  of  Egypt, 
conceived  and  entered  upon  the  execution  of  vast  designs  of  con- 
quest, the  far-reaching  effects  of  which  were  destined  to  live  long 
after  he  had  passed  away.  Inhospitable  steppes  on  the  north,  and 
burning  deserts  on  the  south,  whose  shifting  sands  within  a  period 
yet  fresh  in  memory  had  been  the  grave  of  a  Persian  army,  seemed 
to  be  the  barriers  which  Nature  herself  had  set  for  the  limits  of 
empire  in  these  directions.  But  on  the  eastern  flank  of  the  king- 
dom the  rich  and  crowded  plains  of  India  invited  the  conqueror 
with  promises  of  endless  spoils  and  revenues ;  while  on  the  west 
a  new  continent,  full  of  unknown  mysteries,  presented  virgin  fields 
never  yet  traversed  by  the  army  of  an  Eastern  despot.  Darius 
determined  to  extend  the  frontiers  of  his  empire  in  both  these 
directions. 

At  one  blow  the  region  of  northwestern  India  known  as  the 
Punjab,  was  brought  under  Persian  authority ;  and  thus  with  a  sin- 
gle effort  were  the  eastern  limits  of  the  empire  pushed  out  so  as  to 
include  one  of  the  richest  countries  of  Asia  —  one  which  hence- 
forth returned  to  the  Great  King  an  annual  revenue  vastly  larger 
than  that  of  any  other  province  hitherto  acquired,  not  even  except- 
ing the  rich  district  of  Babylonia. 

With  an  army  numbering,  it  is  said,  more  than  700,000  men, 
Darius  now  crossed  the  Bosphorus  by  means  of  a  sort  of  pontoon 
bridge,  constructed  by  Grecian  architects,  and  passing  the  Danube 
by  means  of  a  similar  bridge,  penetrated  far  into  what  is  now  Rus- 

1  This  important  inscription  is  written  in  the  cuneiform  characters,  and  in 
three  languages,  Aryan,  Turanian,  and  Semitic.  It  is  the  Rosetta  Stone  of 
the  cuneiform  writings,  the  key  to  their  treasures  having  been  obtained  from 
its  parallel  columns. 


80  THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 

sia,  which  was  then  occupied  by  Scythian  hordes.  The  results  of 
the  expedition  were  the  addition  of  Thrace  to  the  Persian  empire, 
and  the  making  of  Macedonia  a  tributary  kingdom.  Thus  the 
Persian  kings  secured  their  first  foothold  upon  the  European 
continent. 

The  most  significant  campaign  in  Europe  was  yet  to  follow.  In 
500  B.C.,  the  Ionian  cities  in  Asia  Minor  subject  to  the  Persian 
authority  revolted.  The  Greeks  of  Europe  lent  aid  to  their  sister 
states.  Sardis  was  sacked  and  burned  by  the  insurgents.  With 
the  revolt  crushed  and  punished  with  great  severity,  Darius  deter- 
mined to  chastise  the  European  Greeks,  and  particularly  the  Athe- 
nians, for  their  insolence  in  giving  aid  to  his  rebellious  subjects. 
Herodotus  tells  us  that  he  appointed  a  person  whose  sole  duty  it 
was  daily  to  stir  up  the  purpose  of  the  king  with  the  words, 
"  Master,  remember  the  Athenians." 

A  large  land  and  naval  armament  was  fitted  out  and  placed 
under  the  command  of  Mardonius,  a  son-in-law  of  Darius.  The 
land  forces  suffered  severe  losses  at  the  hands  of  the  barbarians  of 
Thrace,  and  the  fleet  was  wrecked  by  a  violent  storm  off  Mount 
Athos,  three  hundred  ships  being  lost  (492  B.C.). 

Two  years  after  this  disaster,  another  expedition,  consisting  of 
120,000  men,  was  borne  by  ships  across  the  ALgean  to  the  plains 
of  Marathon.  The  details  of  the  significant  encounter  that  there 
took  place  between  the  Persians  and  the  Athenians  will  be  given 
when  we  come  to  narrate  the  history  of  Greece.  We  need  now 
simply  note  the  result,  —  the  complete  overthrow  of  the  Persian 
forces  by  the  Greeks  under  Miltiades  (490  B.C.). 

Darius,  angered  beyond  measure  by  the  failure  of  the  expedi- 
tion, stirred  up  all  the  provinces  of  his  vast  empire,  and  called  for 
new  levies  from  far  and  near,  resolved  upon  leading  in  person  such 
an  army  into  Greece  that  the  insolent  Athenians  should  be  crushed 
at  a  single  blow,  and  the  tarnished  glory  of  the  Persian  arms 
restored.  In  the  midst  of  these  preparations,  with  the  Egyptians 
in  revolt,  the  king  suddenly  died,  in  the  year  486  B.C. 

Reign  of  Xerxes  I.  (486-465  b.c).  —  The  successor  of  Darius, 


THE  END    OF  THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE.  81 

his  son  Xerxes,  though  more  inclined  to  indulge  in  the  ease  and 
luxury  of  the  palace  than  to  subject  himself  to  the  hardship  and 
discipline  of  the  camp,  was  urged  by  those  about  him  to  an  active 
prosecution  of  the  plans  of  his  father. 

After  crushing  the  Egyptian  revolt  and  another  insurrection  in 
Babylonia,  the  Great  King  was  free  to  devote  his  attention  to  the 
distant  Greeks.  Mustering  the  contingents  of  the  different  prov- 
inces of  his  empire,  Xerxes  led  his  vast  army  over  the  bridges 
he  had  caused  to  be  thrown  across  the  Hellespont,  crushed  the 
Spartan  guards  at  the  Pass  of  Thermopylae,  pushed  on  into  Attica, 
and  laid  Athens  in  ruins.  But  there  fortune  forsook  him.  At  the 
naval  battle  of  Salamis,  his  fleet  was  cut  to  pieces  by  the  Grecian 
ships ;  and  the  king,  making  a  precipitate  retreat  into  Asia,  has- 
tened to  his  capital,  Susa.  Here,  in  the  pleasures  of  the  harem, 
he  sought  solace  for  his  wounded  pride  and  broken  hopes.  He  at 
last  fell  a  victim  to  palace  intrigue,  being  slain  in  his  own  chamber 
(465  B.C.). 

End  of  the  Persian  Empire.  —  The  power  and  supremacy  of 
the  Persian  monarchy  passed  away  with  the  reign  of  Xerxes.  The 
last  one  hundred  and  forty  years  of  the  existence  of  the  empire  was 
a  time  of  weakness  and  anarchy.  This  period  was  spanned  by  the 
reigns  of  eight  kings.  It  was  in  the  reign  of  Artaxerxes  II.,  called 
Mnemon  for  his  remarkable  memory,  that  took  place  the  well- 
known  expedition  of  the  Ten  Thousand  Greeks  under  Cyrus,  the 
brother  of  Artaxerxes,  an  account  of  which  will  be  given  in  con- 
nection with  Grecian  history  (see  chap.  xv.). 

The  march  of  the  Ten  Thousand  through  the  very  heart  of  the 
dominions  of  the  Great  King  demonstrated  the  amazing  internal 
weakness  of  the  empire.  Marathon  and  Salamis  had  shown  the 
immense  superiority  of  the  free  soldiery  of  Greece  over  the  splen- 
did but  servile  armies  of  Persia,  that  were  often  driven  to  battle 
with  the  lash.  These  disclosures  invited  the  Macedonians  to  the 
invasion  and  conquest  of  the  empire. 

In  the  year  334  b.c,  Alexander  the  Great,  king  of  Macedonia, 
led  a  small  army  of  thirty-five  thousand  Greeks  and  Macedonians 


82  THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 

across  the  Hellespont.  Three  great  battles  —  that  of  the  Granicus, 
that  of  Issus,  and  that  of  Arbela  —  decided  the  fate  of  the  Persian 
Empire.  Darius  III.,  the  last  of  the  Persian  kings,  fled  from  the 
field  of  Arbela,  on  the  plains  of  Assyria,  only  to  be  treacherously 
assassinated  by  one  of  his  own  generals. 

The  succeeding  movements  of  Alexander,  and  the  establishment 
by  him  of  the  short-lived  Macedonian  monarchy  upon  the  ruins 
of  the  Persian  state,  are  matters  that  properly  belong  to  Grecian 
history,  and  will  be  related  in  a  following  chapter. 

2.   Government,  Religion,  and  Arts. 

The  Government.  —  Before  the  reign  of  Darius  I.,  the  govern- 
ment of  the  Persian  Empire  was  like  that  of  all  the  great  monarchies 
that  had  preceded  it ;  that  is,  it  consisted  of  a  great  number  of 
subject  states,  which  were  allowed  to  retain  their  own  kings  and 
manage  their  own  affairs,  only  paying  tribute  and  homage,  and 
furnishing  contingents  in  time  of  war,  to  the  Great  King. 

We  have  seen  how  weak  was  this  rude  and  primitive  type  of 
government.  Darius  I.,  who  possessed  rare  ability  as  an  organizer, 
remodelled  the  system  of  his  predecessors,  and  actually  realized 
for  the  Persian  monarchy  what  Tiglath-Pileser  II.  had  long  before 
attempted,  but  only  with  partial  and  temporary  success,  to  accom- 
plish for  the  Assyrian. 

The  system  of  government  which  Darius  I.  thus  first  made  a 
real  fact  in  the  world,  is  known  as  the  satrapal,  a  form  represented 
to-day  by  the  government  of  the  Turkish  Sultan.  The  entire 
kingdom  was  divided  into  twenty  or  more  provinces,  over  each  of 
which  was  placed  a  governor,  called  a  satrap,  appointed  by  the 
king.  These  officials  held  their  position  at  the  pleasure  of  the 
sovereign,  and  were  thus  rendered  his  subservient  creatures.  Each 
province  contributed  to  the  income  of  the  king  a  stated  revenue. 

There  were  provisions  in  the  system  by  which  the  king  might 
be  apprised  of  the  disloyalty  of  his  satraps.  Thus  the  whole 
dominion  was  firmly  cemented   together,  and   the   facility  with 


Z  OR  OA  S  TRIA  NISM. 


83 


vesta, 
part    is 


which  almost  sovereign  states  —  which  was  the  real  character  of 
the  different  parts  of  the  empire  under  the  old  system  —  could 
plan  and  execute  revolt,  was  removed. 

Literature  and  Religion:  Zoroastrianism.  —  The  literature  of 
the  ancient  Persians  was  mostly  religious.  Their  sacred  book  is 
called  the  Zenda- 
The  oldest 
named  tjie 
Vendidad.  This  con- 
sists of  laws,  incan- 
tations, and  mythical 
tales. 

The  religious  sys- 
tem of  the  Persians, 
as  taught  in  the  Zend- 
avesta,  is  known  as 
Zoroastrianism,  from 
Zoroaster,  its  founder. 
This  great  reformer 
and  teacher  is  now 
generally  supposed  to 
have  lived  and  taught 
about  iooo  B.C. 

Zoroastrianism  was 
a  system  of  belief 
known  as  dualism. 
Opposed  to  the 
"  good  spirit,"  Or- 
mazd  (Ahura  Maz- 
da), there  was  a 
"dark  spirit,"  Ahriman  ( Angro-Mainyus ) ,  who  was  constantly 
striving  to  destroy  the  good  creations  of  Ormazd  by  creating  all 
evil  things  —  storm,  drought,  pestilence,  noxious  animals,  weeds 
and  thorns  in  the  world  without,  and  evil  in  the  heart  of  man 
within.     From  all  eternity  these  two  powers  had  been  contending 


THE   KING  IN  COMBAT  WITH  A  MONSTER. 
(From  Persepolis.) 


84  THE  PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 

for  the  mastery;  in  the  present  neither  had  the  decided  advan- 
tage ;  but  in  the  near  future  Ormazd  would  triumph  over  Ahriman, 
and  evil  be  forever  destroyed. 

The  duty  of  man  was  to  aid  Ormazd  by  working  with  him 
against  the  evil-loving  Ahriman.  He  must  labor  to  eradicate  every 
evil  and  vice  in  his  own  bosom ;  to  reclaim  the  earth  from 
barrenness ;  and  to  kill  all  bad  animals  —  frogs,  toads,  snakes, 
lizards  —  which  Ahriman  had  created.  Herodotus  saw  with 
amazement  the  Magian  priests  armed  with  weapons  and  en- 
gaged in  slaying  these  animals  as  a  "pious  pastime."  Agri- 
culture was  a  sacred  calling,  for  the  husbandman  was  reclaiming 
the  ground  from  the  curse  of  the  Dark  Spirit.  Thus  men  might 
become  co-workers  with  Ormazd  in  the  mighty  work  of  over- 
throwing and  destroying  the  kingdom  of  the  wicked  Ahriman. 

The  evil  man  was  he  who  allowed  vice  and  degrading  passions 
to  find  a  place  in  his  own  soul,  and  neglected  to  exterminate  nox- 
ious animals  and  weeds,  and  to  help  redeem  the  earth  from  the 
barrenness  and  sterility  created  by  the  enemy  of  Ormazd.1 

After  death  the  souls  of  the  good  and  the  bad  alike  must  pass 
over  a  narrow  bridge  :  the  good  soul  crosses  in  safety,  and  is 
admitted  to  the  presence  of  Ahura  Mazda ;  while  the  evil  soul  is 
sure  to  fall  from  the  path,  sharp  as  the  edge  of  a  scimitar,  into  a 
pit  of  woe,  the  dwelling-place  of  Ahriman. 

Architecture.  —  The  simple  religious  faith  of  the  Persians  dis- 
couraged, though  it  did  not  prohibit,  the  erection  of  temples  : 
their  sacred  architecture  scarcely  included  more  than  an  altar  and 

1  The  belief  of  the  Zoroastrians  in  the  sacredness  of  the  elements,  —  earth, 
water,  fire,  and  air,  —  created  a  difficulty  in  regard  to  the  disposal  of  dead 
bodies.  They  could  neither  be  burned,  buried,  thrown  into  the  water,  nor  left 
to  decay  in  a  sepulchral  chamber  or  in  the  open  air,  without  polluting  one  or 
another  of  the  sacred  elements.  So  they  were  given  to  the  birds  and  wild 
beasts,  being  exposed  on  lofty  towers  or  in  desert  places.  Those  whose  feel- 
ings would  not  allow  them  thus  to  dispose  of  their  dead,  were  permitted  to 
bury  them,  provided  they  first  encased  the  body  in  wax,  to  preserve  the  ground 
from  contamination.  The  modern  Parsees,  or  Fire-Worshippers,  give  their 
dead  to  the  birds. 


ARCHITECTURE. 


85 


pedestal.     The  palace  of  the  monarch  was  the  structure  that  ab- 
sorbed the  best  efforts  of  the  Persian  artist. 

In  imitation  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  valley  of  the  Euphrates, 
the  Persian  kings  raised  their  palaces  upon  lofty  terraces,  or  plat- 
forms. But  upon  the  table-lands  they  used  stone  instead  of  adobe 
or  brick,  and  at  Persepolis,  raised,  for  the  substruction  of  their  pal- 
aces, an  immense  platform  of  massive  masonry,  which  is  one  of 
the  most  wonderful  monuments  of  the  world's  ancient  builders. 
This  terrace,  which  is  uninjured  by  the  2300  years  that  have  passed 
since  its  erection,  is  about  1500  feet  long,  1000  feet  wide,  and 


THE   RUINS   OF   PERSEPOLIS. 


40  feet  high.  The  summit  is  reached  by  broad  stairways  of  stone, 
pronounced  by  competent  judges  the  finest  work  of  the  kind  that 
the  ancient  or  even  the  modern  world  can  boast. 

Surmounting  this  platform  are  the  ruins  of  the  palaces  of  several 
of  the  Persian  monarchs,  from  Cyrus  the  Great  to  Artaxerxes 
Ochus.  These  ruins  consist  chiefly  of  walls,  columns,  and  great 
monolithic  door-  and  window-frames.  Colossal  winged  bulls, 
copied  from  the  Assyrians,  stand  as  wardens  at  the  gateway  of 
the  ruined  palaces. 


86 


THE   PERSIAN  EMPIRE. 


Numerous  sculptures  in  bas-relief  decorate  the  faces  of  the  walls, 
and  these  throw  much  light  upon  the  manners  and  customs  of  the 
ancient  Persian  kings.  The  successive  palaces  increase,  not  only 
in  size,  but  in  sumptuousness  of  adornment,  thus  registering  those 
changes  which  we  have  been  tracing  in  the  national  history.  The 
residence  of  Cyrus  was  small  and  modest,  while  that  of  Artaxerxes 
Ochus  equalled  in  size  the  great  palace  of  the  Assyrian  Sargon. 


TABLE   OF   KINGS   OF   MEDIA  AND    PERSIA. 


Kings  of  Media 


Kings  of  Persia 


Phraortes ?     -625 

Cyaxares 625-585 

Astyages 585"558 

Cyrus.     . 558-529 

Cambyses 529-522 

Pseudo-Smerdis 522-521 

Darius  1 521-486 

Xerxes  1 486-465 

Artaxerxes  I.  (Longimanus) 465-425 

Xerxes  II 425 

Sogdianus 425-424 

Darius  II.  (Nothus) 424-405 

Artaxerxes  II.  (Mnemon) 4°5_359 

Artaxerxes  III.  (Ochus) 359~338 

Arses 338-336 

.  Darius  III.  (Codomannus) 336-330 


SECTION    II— GRECIAN    HISTORY. 

CHAPTER    IX. 

THE    LAND   AND  THE   PEOPLE. 

Divisions  of  Greece.  —  Long  arms  of  the  sea  divide  the  Grecian 
peninsula  into  three  parts,  called  Northern,  Central,  and  Southern 
Greece. 

Northern  Greece  included  the  ancient  districts  of  Thessaly  and 
Epirus.  Thessaly  consists  mainly  of  a  large  and  beautiful  valley, 
walled  in  on  all  sides  by  rugged  mountains.  It  was  celebrated 
far  and  wide  for  the  variety  and  beauty  of  its  scenery.  On  its 
northern  edge,  lay  a  beautiful  glen,  called  the  Vale„of  Tempe^the 
only  pass  by  which  the  plain  of  Thessaly  could  be  entered  from 
the  north.  The  district  of  Epirus  stretched  along  the  Ionian  Sea 
on  the  west.  In  the  gloomy  recesses  of  its  forests  of  oak  was 
situated  the  renowned  Dodonean  oracle  of  Zeus. 

Central  Greece  was  divided  into  eleven  districts,  among  which 
were  Phocis,  Bceotia,  and  Attica.  In  Phocis  was  the  city  of 
Delphi,  famous  For  its  oracle  and  temple;  in  Bceotia,  the  city  of 
Thebes  ;  and  in  Attica,  the  brilliant  Athens. 

Southern  Greece,  or  the  Peloponnesus,  was  also  divided  into 
eleven  provinces,  of  which  the  more  important  were  Arcadia^, 
embracing  the  central  part  of  the  peninsula  ;  Achaia,  the  northern 
part ;  Argolis,  the  eastern;  and  Messenia  and  Laconia,  the  south- 
ern. The  last  district  was  ruled  by  the  city  of  Sparta,  the  great 
rival  of  Athens. 

Mountains. — The  Cambunian  Mountains  form  a  lofty  wall 
along  a  considerable  reach  of  the  northern  frontier  of  Greece, 


88  THE  LAND  AND    THE  PEOPLE. 

shutting  out  at  once  the  cold  winds  and  hostile  races  from  the 
north.  Branching  off  at  right  angles  to  these  mountains  is  the 
Pindus  range,  which  runs  south  into  Central  Greece. 

In  Northern  Thessaly  is  Mount  Olympus,  the  most  celebrated 
mountain  of  the  peninsula.  The  ancient  Greeks  thought  it  the 
highest  mountain  in  the  world  (it  is  9700  feet  in  height),  and 
believed  that  its  cloudy  summit  was  the  abode  of  the  celestials. 

South  of  Olympus,  close  by  the  sea,  are  Ossa  and  Peliom  cele- 
brated in  fable  as  the  mountains  which  the  giants,  in  their  war 
against  the  gods,  piled  one  upon  another,  in  order  to  scale 
Olympus. 

Parnassus  and  Helicon,  in  Central  Greece,  —  beautiful  moun- 
tains clad  with  trees  and  vines  and  filled  with  fountains,  —  were 
believed  to  be  the  favorite  haunts  of  the  Muses.  Near  Athens  are 
Hymettus,  praised  for  its  honey,  and  Pentelicus,  renowned  for  its 
marbles. 

The  Peloponnesus  is  rugged  with  mountains  that  radiate  in  all 
directions  from  the  central  country  of  Arcadia,  —  "  the  Switzerland 
of  Greece." 

Islands  about  Greece. — Very  much  of  the  history  of  Greece 
is  intertwined  with  the  islands  that  lie  about  the  mainland.  On 
the  east,  in  the  ^Egean  Sea,  are  the  Cyclades,  so  called  because 
they  form  an  irregular  circle  about  the  sacred  isle  of  Delos,  where 
was  a  very  celebrated  shrine  of  Apollo.  Between  the  Cyclades  and 
Asia  Minor  lie  the  Sporades,  which  islands,  as  the  name  implies, 
are  sown  irregularly  over  that  portion  of  the  ^Egean. 

Just  off  the  coast  of  Attica  is  a  large  island  called  by  the 
ancients  Euboea,  but  known  to  us  as  Negropont.  Close  to  the 
Asian  shores  are  the  large  islands  of  Lesbos,  Chios,  Samos,  and 
Rhodes. 

To  the  west  of  Greece  lie  the  Ionian  Islands,  the  largest  of  which 
was  called  Corcyra,  now  Corfu.  The  rugged  island  of  Ithaca  was 
the  birthplace  of  Odysseus,  or  Ulysses,  the  hero  of  the  Odyssey. 
Cythera,  just  south  of  the  Peloponnesus,  was  sacred  to  Aphrodite 
(Venus),  as  it  was  here  fable  said  she  rose  from  the  sea-foam. 


INFLUENCE   OF  COUNTRY.  89 

Beyond  Cythera,  in  the  Mediterranean,  midway  between  Greece 
and  Egypt,  is  the  large  island  of  Crete,  noted  in  legend  for  its 
labyrinth  and  its  legislator  Minos. 

Influence  of  Country.  —  The  physical  features  of  a  country 
have  much  to  do  with  the  moulding  of  the  character  and  the  shap- 
ing of  the  history  of  its  people.  ^fountains,  isolating  neighboring 
communities  and  shutting  out  conquering  races,  foster  the  spirit  of 
|ocal  patriotism  and  preserve  freedom;  the^s^a,  inviting  abroad, 
and  rendering  intercourse  with  distant  countries  easy,  awakens  the 
spirit  of  adventure  and  develops  commercial  enterprise. 

Now,  Greece  is  at  once  a  mountainous  and  a  maritime  country. 
Abrupt  mountain-walls  fence  it  off  into  a  great  number  of  isolated 
districts,  each  of  which  in  ancient  times  became  the  seat  of  a 
distinct  community,  or  state.  Hence  the  fragmentary  character 
of  its  political  history.  The  Hellenic  states  never  coalesced  to 
form  a  single  nation. 

The  peninsula  is,  moreover,  by  deep  arms  and  bays  of  the  sea, 
converted  into  what  is  in  effect  an  archipelago.  (No  spot  in« 
Greece  is  forty  miles  from  the  sea.)  Hence  its  people  were  early 
tempted  to  a  sea-faring  life.  The  shores  of  the  Mediterranean 
and  the  Euxine  were  dotted  with  Hellenic  colonies.  Intercourse 
with  the  old  civilizations  of  Egypt  and  Phoenicia  stirred  the  natur- 
ally quick  and  versatile  Greek  intellect  to  early  and  vigorous 
thought.  The  islands  strewn  with  seeming  carelessness  through 
the  yEgean  Sea  were  "  stepping-stones,"  which  invited  the  earliest 
settlers  of  Greece  to  the  delightful  coast  countries  of  Asia  Minor, 
and  thus  blended  the  life  and  history  of  the  opposite  shores. 

Again,  the  beauty  of  Grecian  scenery  inspired  many  of  the  most 
{Striking  passages  of  her  poets ;  and  it  is  thought  that  the  exhila- 
rating atmosphere  and  brilliant  skies  of  Attica  were  not  unrelated 
ko  the  lofty  achievements  of  the  Athenian  intellect. 

The  Pelasgians.  — The  historic  inhabitants  of  the  land  we  have 
described  were  called  by  the  Romans  Greeks,  but  they  called 
themselves  Hellenes,  from  their  fabled  ancestor  Hellen. 

But  the  Hellenes,  according  to  their  own  account,  were  not  the 


90  THE  LAND  AND    THE  PEOPLE. 

original  inhabitants  of  the  country.  They  were  preceded  by  a 
people  whom  they  called  Pelasgians.  Who  these  folk  were  is  a 
matter  of  debate.  Some  think  that  the  Pelasgians  and  Hellenes 
were  kindred  tribes,  but  that  the  Hellenes,  possessing  superior 
qualities,  gradually  acquired  ascendency  over  the  Pelasgians  and 
finally  absorbed  them. 


PREHISTORIC   WALLS    AT   MYCEN/E.      (The  Lions'  Gate.) 

The  Pelasgians  were  somewhat  advanced  beyond  the  savage 
state.  They  cultivated  the  ground,  and  protected  their  cities 
with  walls.  Remnants  of  their  rude  but  massive  masonry  still 
encumber  in  places  the  soil  of  Greece. 

The  Hellenes.  —  The  Hellenes  were  divided  into  four  tribes ; 
namely,  the  Ionians,  the  Dorians,  the  Achseans,  and  the  Cohans. 


THE  HELLENES.  91 

The  lonians  were  a  many-sided,  imaginative  people.  They 
developed  every  part  of  their  nature,  and  attained  unsurpassed 
excellence  in  zx\  literature,  and  philosophy.  The  most  noted 
Ionian  city  was  ^At^ens^  whose  story  is  a  large  part  of  the  history 
of  Hellas. 

The  Dorians  were  a  practical,  unimaginative  race.  Their  speech 
and  their  art  were  both  alike  without  ornament.  They  developed 
the  body  rather  than  the  mind.  Their  education  was  almost 
wholly  gymnastic  and  military.  They  were  unexcelled  as  warriors. 
The  most  important  city  founded  by  them  was  Sparta,  the  rival  of 
Athens. 

These  two  great  Hellenic  families  divided  Hellas1  into  two 
rival  parties,  which  through  their  mutual  jealousies  and  contentions 
finally  brought  all  the  bright  hopes  and  promises  of  the  Hellenic 
race  to  utter  ruin. 

The  Achaeans  are  represented  by  the  Greek  legends  as  being 
the  predominant  race  in  the  Peloponnesus  during  the  Heroic  Age. 
The  yEolians  formed  a  rather  ill-defined  division.  In  historic 
times  the  name  is  often  made  to  include  all  Hellenes  not  enu- 
merated as  Ionians  or  Dorians. 

These  several  tribes,  united  by  bonds  of  language  and  religion, 
always  regarded  themselves  as  members  of  a  single  family.  They 
were  proud  of  their  ancestry,  and  as  exclusive  almost  as  the 
Hebrews.    All  non- Hellenic  people  they  called  Barbarians."1 

When  the  mists  of  antiquity  are  first  lifted  from  Greece,  about 
the  beginning  of  the  eighth  century  h.c,  we  discover  the  several 
families  of  the  Hellenic  race  in  possession  of  Greece  proper,  of  the 
islands  of  the  /Egean,  and  of  the  western  coasts  of  Asia  Minor. 
Respecting  their  prehistoric  migrations  and  settlements,  we  have 
little  or  no  certain  knowledge. 

1  Under  the  name  Hellas  the  ancient  Greeks  included  not  only  Greece 
proper  and  the  islands  of  the  adjoining  seas,  but  also  the  Hellenic    cities  in 

Minor,  Southern  Italy,  Sicily,  and  elsewhere.    "Wherever  were  Hellenes, 
there  was  Hellas." 

2  At  first,  this  term  meant  scarcely  more  than  "  unintelligible  folk";  but 
later,  it  came  to  express  aversion  and  contempt. 


92  THE  LAND  AND    THE  PEOPLE. 

Oriental  Immigrants.  —  According  to  their  own  traditions  the 
early  growth  of  civilization  among  the  European  Hellenes  was 
promoted  by  the  settlement  among  them  of  Oriental  immigrants, 
who  brought  with  them  the  arts  and  culture  of  the  different  coun- 
tries of  the  East. 

From  Egypt,  legend  affirms,  came  Cecrops,  bringing  with  him 
the  arts,  learning,  and  priestly  wisdom  of  the  Nile  valley.  He  is 
represented  as  the  builder  of  the  citadel  (the  Cecropia)  of  what 
was  afterwards  the  illustrious  city  of  Athens.  From  Phoenicia 
Cadmus  brought  the  letters  of  the  alphabet,  and  founded  the  city 
of  Thebes.  The  Phrygian  Pelops,  the  progenitor  of  the  renowned 
heroes  Agamemnon  and  Menelaus,  settled  in  the  southern  penin- 
sula, which  was  called  after  him  the  Peloponnesus  (the  Island  of 
Pelops) . 

The  nucleus  of  fact  in  all  these  legends  is  probably  this,  —  that 
the  European  Greeks  received  the  primary  elements  of  their  cul- 
ture from  the  East  through  their  Asiatic  kinsmen. 

Local  Patriotism  of  the  Greeks :  the  City  the  Political  Unit. 
—  The  narrow  political  sympathies  of  the  ancient  Greeks  pre- 
vented their  ever  uniting  to  form  a  single  nation.  The  .city  was 
with  them  the  political  unit.  It  was  regarded  as  a  distinct,  self- 
governing  state,  just  like  a  modern  nation.  A  citizen  of  one  city 
was  an  alien  in  any  other :  he  could  not  marry  a  woman  of  a  city 
not  his  own,  nor  hold  property  in  houses  or  lands  within  its  terri- 
tory. 

A  Greek  city-state  usually  embraced,  besides  the  walled  town, 
a  more  or  less  extensive  border  of  gardens  and  farms,  a  strip  of 
sea-coast,  or  perhaps  a  considerable  mountain-hemmed  valley  or 
plain.  The  model  city  (or  state,  as  we  should  say)  must  not  be 
over  large.  In  this,  as  in  everything  else,  the  ancient  Greeks 
applied  the  Delphian  rule  —  "  Measure  in  all  things."  "  A  small 
city,"  says  one  of  their  poets,  "  set  upon  a  rock  and  well  governed, 
is  better  than  all  foolish  Nineveh."  \Aristotle  thought  that  the 
ideal  city  should  not  have  more  than  ten  thousand  citizens.V 


CHARACTER   OF  THE  LEGENDARY  AGE.  93 


CHAPTER   X. 

THE  LEGENDARY,  OR   HEROIC  AGE. 

(From  the  earliest  times  to  776  B.C.) 

Character  of  the  Legendary  Age. — The  real  history  of  the 
Greeks  does  not  begin  before  the  eighth  century  B.C.  All  that 
lies  back  of  that  date  is  an  inseparable  mixture  of  myth,  legend, 
and  fact.  Yet  this  shadowy  period  forms  the  background  of  Gre- 
cian history,  and  we  cannot  understand  the  ideas  and  acts  of  the 
Greeks  of  historic  times  without  at  least  some  knowledge  of  what 
they  believed  their  ancestors  did  and  experienced  in  those  pre- 
historic ages. 

So,  as  a  sort  of  prelude  to  the  story  we  have  to  tell,  we  shall 
repeat  some  of  the  legends  of  the  Greeks  respecting  their  national 
heroes  and  their  great  labors  and  undertakings.  But  it  must  be 
carefully  borne  in  mind  that  these  legends  are  not  history,  though 
some  of  them  may  be  confused  remembrances  of  actual  events. 

The  Heroes:  Heracles,  Theseus,  and  Minos.  —  The  Greeks 
believed  that  their  ancestors  were  a  race  of  heroes  of  divine  or 
semi-divine  lineage.  Every  tribe,  district,  city,  and  village  even, 
preserved  traditions  of  its  heroes,  whose  wonderful  exploits  were 
commemorated  in  song  and  story.  Many  of  these  personages 
acquired  national  renown,  and  became  the  revered  heroes  of  the 
whole  Greek  race. 

rJei-Q/-!^  was  the  greatest  of  the  national  heroes  of  the  Greeks. 
He  is  represented  as  performing,  besides  various  other  exploits, 
twelve  superhuman  labors,  and  as  being  at  last  translated  from  a 
blazing  pyre  to  a  place  among  the  immortal  gods.  The  myth  of 
Heracles,  who  was  at  first  a  solar  divinity,  is  made  up  mainly  of 
the  very  same  fables  that  were  told  of  the  Chaldaean  solar  hero 


94  THE  LEGENDARY,    OR  HEROIC  AGE. 

Izdubar  (see  p.  46).  Through  the  Phoenicians,  these  stories  found 
their  way  to  the  Greeks,  who  ascribed  to  their  own  Heracles  the 
deeds  of  the  Chaldaean  sun-god. 

Theseus,  a  descendant  of  Cecrops,  was  the  favorite  hero  of  the 
Athenians,  being  one  of  their  legendary  kings.  *  Among  his  great 
exploits  was  the  slaying  of  the  Minotaur,  —  a  monster  which 
Minos,  king  of  Crete,  kept  in  a  labyrinth,  and  fed  upon  youths 
and  maidens  sent  from  Athens  as  a  forced  tribute. 

Minos,  king  of  Crete,  was  one  of  the  greatest  tribal  heroes  of 
the  Dorians.  Legend  makes  him  a  legislator  of  divine  wisdom, 
the  suppressor  of  piracy  in  the  Grecian  seas,  and  the  founder 
of  the  first  great  maritime  state  of  Hellas. 

The  Argonautic  Expedition.  — Besides  the  labors  and  exploits 
of  single  heroes,  the  legends  of  the  Greeks  tell  of  several  memora- 
ble enterprises  conducted  by  bands  of  heroes.  Among  these  were 
the  Argonautic  Expedition  and  the  Siege  of  Troy. 

The  tale  of  the  Argonautic  Expedition  is  told  with  many  varia- 
tions in  the  legends  of  the  Greeks.  Jason,  a  prince  of  Thessaly, 
with  fifty  companion  heroes,  among  whom  were  Heracles,  Theseus, 
and  Orpheus,  the  latter  a  musician  of  superhuman  skill,  the  music 
of  whose  lyre  moved  brutes  and  stones,  set  sail  in  "  a  fifty-oared 
galley,"  called  the  Argo  (hence  the  name  Argonauts,  given  to  the 
heroes),  in  search  of  a  "golden  fleece"  which  was  fabled  to  be 
nailed  to  a  tree  and  watched  by  a  dragon,  in  the  Grove  of  Ares, 
on  the  eastern  shores  of  the  Euxine,  an  inhospitable  region  of  un- 
known terrors.  The  expedition  is  successful,  and,  after  many  won- 
derful adventures,  the  heroes  return  in  triumph  with  the  sacred  relic. 

Different  meanings  have  been  given  to  this  tale.  In  its  primi- 
tive form  it  was  doubtless  a  pure  myth  of  the  rain-clouds ;  but  in 
its  later  forms  we  may  believe  it  to  symbolize  the  maritime  explo- 
rations in  the  eastern  seas,  of  some  of  the  tribes  of  Pelasgian 
Greece. 

The  Trojan  War  (legendary  date  11 94-1 184  B.C.). — The 
Trojan  War  was  an  event  about  which  gathered  a  great  circle  of 
tales  and  poems,  all  full  of  an  undying  interest  and  fascination. 


THE    TROJAN   WAR.  95 

Ilios,  or  Troy,  was  the  capital  of  a  strong  empire,  represented 
as  Grecian  in  race  and  language,  which  had  grown  up  in  Asia 
Minor,  along  the  shores  of  the  Hellespont.  The  traditions  tell 
how  Paris,  son  of  Priam,  king  of  Troy,  visited  the  Spartan  king 
Menelaus,  and  ungenerously  requited  his  hospitality  by  secretly 
bearing  away  to  Troy  his  wife  Helen,  famous  for  her  rare  beauty. 

All  the  heroes  of  Greece  flew  to  arms  to  avenge  the  wrong.  A 
host  of  one  hundred  thousand  warriors  was  speedily  gathered. 
Agamemnon,  brother  of  Menelaus  and  "  king  of  men,"  was  chosen 
leader  of  the  expedition.  Under  him  were  the  "lion-hearted 
Achilles,"  of  Thessaly,  the  "crafty  Ulysses"  (Odysseus),  king  of 
Ithaca,  Ajax,  "  the  swift  son  of  Oileus,"  the  Telamonian  Ajax,  the 
aged  Nestor,  and  many  more  —  the  most  valiant  heroes  of  all 
Hellas.  Twelve  hundred  galleys  bore  the  gathered  clans  from 
Aulis  in  Greece,  across  the  ^Egean  to  the  Trojan  shores. 

For  ten  years  the  Greeks  and  their  allies  hold  in  close  siege  the 
city  of  Priam.  On  the  plains  beneath  the  walls  of  the  capital,  the 
warriors  of  the  two  armies  fight  in  general  battle,  or  contend  in 
single  encounter.  At  first,  Achilles  is  foremost  in  every  fight ;  but 
a  fair-faced  maiden,  who  fell  to  him  as  a  prize,  having  been  taken 
from  him  by  his  chief,  Agamemnon,  he  is  filled  with  wrath,  and 
sulks  in  his  tent.  Though  the  Greeks  are  often  sorely  pressed, 
still  the  angered  hero  refuses  them  his  aid.  At  last,  however,  his 
friend  Patroclus  is  killed  by  Hector,  eldest  son  of  Priam,  and  then 
Achilles  goes  forth  to  avenge  his  death.  In  a  fierce  combat  he 
slays  Hector,  fastens  his  body  to  his  chariot  wheels,  and  drags  it 
thrice  around  the  walls  of  Troy. 

The  city  is  at  last  taken  through  a  device  of  the  "  crafty  Ulys- 
ses." Upon  the  plain  in  sight  of  the  walls  is  built  a  wooden  statue 
of  a  horse,  in  the  body  of  which  are  hidden  several  Grecian  war- 
riors. Then  the  Greeks  retire  to  their  ships,  as  though  about  to 
abandon  the  siege.  The  Trojans  issue  from  the  gates  and  gather 
in  wondering  crowds  about  the  image.  They  believe  it  to  be  an 
offering  sac  red  to  Athena,  and  so  dare  not  destroy  it ;  but,  on  the 
Other  hand,  misled  by  certain  omens  and  by  a  lying  Greek  named 


96  THE  LEGENDARY,   OR  HEROIC  AGE. 

Sinon,  they  level  a  place  in  the  walls  of  their  city,  and  drag  the 
statue  within.  At  night  the  concealed  warriors  issue  from  the 
horse,  open  the  gates  of  the  city  to  the  Grecians,  and  Troy  is 
sacked,  and  burned  to  the  ground.  The  aged  Priam  is  slain,  after 
having  seen  his  sons  and  many  of  his  warriors  perish  before  his 
face.  ^Eneas,  with  his  aged  father,  Anchises,  and  a  few  devoted 
followers,  escapes,  and,  after  long  wanderings,  becomes  the  fabled 
founder  of  the  Roman  race  in  Italy. 

It  is  a  matter  of  difficulty  to  point  out  the  nucleus  of  fact  in 
this  the  most  elaborate  and  interesting  of  the  Grecian  legends. 
Some  believe  it  to  be  the  dim  recollection  of  a  prehistoric  conflict 
between  the  Greeks  and  the  natives  of  Asia  Minor,  arising  from  the 
attempt  of  the  former  to  secure  a  foothold  upon  the  coast.  That 
there  really  existed  in  prehistoric  times  such  a  city  as  Troy,  has 
been  placed  beyond  doubt  by  the  excavations  and  discoveries 
of  Dr.  Schliemann. 

Return  of  the  Grecian  Chieftains.  —  After  the  fall  of  Troy,  the 
Grecian  chieftains  and  princes  returned  home.  The  poets  repre- 
sent the  gods  as  withdrawing  their  protection  from  the  hitherto 
favored  heroes,  because  they  had  not  respected  the  altars  of  the 
Trojans.  So,  many  of  them  were  driven  in  endless  wanderings  over 
sea  and  land.  Homer's  Odyssey  portrays  the  sufferings  of  the 
"much-enduring"  Odysseus  (Ulysses),  impelled  by  divine  wrath 
to  long  journeyings  through  strange  seas. 

In  some  cases,  according  to  the  tradition,  advantage  had  been 
taken  of  the  absence  of  the  princes,  and  their  thrones  had  been 
usurped.  Thus  at  Argos,  .^Egisthus  had  won  the  unholy  love  of 
Clytemnestra,  wife  and  queen  of  Agamemnon,  who  on  his  return 
was  murdered  by  the  guilty  couple.  In  pleasing  contrast  with  this 
we  have  exhibited  to  us  the  constancy  of  Penelope,  although  sought 
by  many  suitors  during  the  absence  of  her  husband  Ulysses. 

The  Dorian  Invasion,  or  the  Return  of  the  Heraclidae  (leg- 
endary date  1 104  B.C.). — We  set  the  tradition  of  the  return  of 
the  Heraclidae  apart  from  the  legends  of  the  enterprises  just 
detailed,  for  the  reason  that  it  undoubtedly  contains  quite  a  large 


MIGRATIONS   TO  ASIA  MINOR.  97 

historical  element.  The  legend  tells  how  Heracles,  an  Achaean,  in 
the  times  before  the  Trojan  War,  ruled  over  the  Peloponnesian 
Achaeans.  Just  before  that  event  his  children  were  driven  from  the 
land.  Eighty  years  after  the  war,  the  hundred  years  of  exile  ap- 
pointed by  the  Fates  having  expired,  the  descendants  of  the  hero, 
at  the  head  of  the  Dorians  from  Northern  Greece,  returned,  and 
with  their  aid  effected  the  conquest  of  the  greater  part  of  the 
Peloponnesus,  and  established  themselves  as  conquerors  and  mas- 
ters in  the  lanc^that  had  formerly  been  ruled  by  their  semi-divine 
ancestor. 

This  legend  seems  to  be  a  dim  remembrance  of  a  prehistoric 
invasion  of  the  Peloponnesus  by  the  Dorians  from  the  north  of 
Greece,  and  the  expulsion  or  subjugation  of  the  native  inhabitants 
of  the  peninsula. 

Some  of  the  dispossessed  Achaeans,  crowding  towards  the  north 
of  the  Peloponnesus,  drove  out  the  Ionians  who  occupied  the  south- 
ern shore  of  the  Corinthian  Gulf,  and  settling  there,  gave  the  name 
Achaia  to  all  that  region. 

Arcadia,  in  the  centre  of  the  Peloponnesus,  was  another  district 
which  did  not  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Dorians.  The  people 
here,  even  down  to  the  latest  times,  retained  their  primitive  cus- 
toms and  country  mode  of  life ;  hence  Arcadian  came  to  mean 
_rustic_and  artless.  — . 

Migrations  to  Asia  Minor.  —  The  Greek  legends  represent  that 
the  Dorian  invasion  of  the  Peloponnesus  resulted  in  three  distinct 
migrations  from  the  mother-land  to  the  shores  of  Asia  Minor  and 
the  adjoining  islands. 

The  northwestern  shore  of  Asia  Minor  was  settled,  mainly,  by 
yEolian  emigrants  from  Bceotia.  The  neighboring  island  of  Lesbos 
became  the  home  and  centre  of  ^Eolian  culture  in  poetry  and 
music. 

The  coast  to  the  south  of  the  /Eolians  was  occupied  by  Ionian 
emigrants,  who,  uniting  with  their  Ionian  kinsmen  already  settled 
upon  that  shore,  built  up  twelve  splendid  cities  (Ephesus,  Miletus, 
etc. ) ,  which  finally  united  to  form  the  celebrated  Ionian  confederacy. 


A 


98  THE  LEGENDARY,    OR  HEROIC  AGE. 

South  of  the  Ionians,  all  along  the  southwestern  shore  of  Asia 
Minor,  the  Dorians  established  their  colonies.  They  also  settled 
the  important  islands  of  Cos  and  Rhodes,  and  conquered  and  col- 
onized Crete. 

The  traditions  of  these  various  settlements  represent  them  as 
having  been  effected  in  a  very  short  period  ;  but  it  is  probable  that 
the  movement  embraced  several  centuries,  —  possibly  a  longer  time 
than  has  been  occupied  by  the  English  race  in  colonizing  the  dif- 
ferent lands  of  the  Western  World.  # 

With  these  migrations  to  the  Asiatic  shores,  the  Legendary  Age 
I  of  Greece  comes  to  an  end.  From  this  time  forward  we  tread 
upon  fairly  firm  historic  ground. 

Society  in  the  Heroic  Age.  —  In  Homeric  times  the  Greeks 
were  ruled  by  hereditary  kings,  who  were  believed  to  be  of  divine 
or  superhuman  lineage.  The  king  was  at  once  the  lawgiver,  the 
judge,  and  the  military  leader  of  his  people.  He  was  expected 
to  prove  his  divine  right  to  rule,  by  his  courage,  strength,  wisdom, 
and  eloquence.  When  he  ceased  to  display  these  qualities,  "  the 
sceptre  departed  from  him." 

The  king  was  surrounded  by  an  advisory  council  of  chiefs  or 
nobles.  The  king  listened  to  what  the  nobles  had  to  say  upon  any 
measure  he  might  propose,  and  then  acted  according  to  his  own 
will  or  judgment,  restrained  only  by  the  time-honored  customs  of 
the  community. 

Next  to  the  council  of  chiefs,  there  was  a  general  assembly, 
called  the  Agora,  made  up  of  all  the  common  freemen.  The 
members  of  this  body  could  not  take  part  in  any  debate,  nor 
could  they  vote  upon  any  question.  This  body,  so  devoid  seem- 
ingly of  all  authority  in  the  Homeric  age,  was  destined  to  become 
the  all-powerful  popular  assembly  in  the  democratic  cities  of  his- 
toric Greece. 

Of  the  condition  of  the  common  freemen  we  know  but  little ; 
the  legendary  tales  were  concerned  chiefly  with  the  kings  and 
nobles.  Slavery  existed,  but  the  slaves  did  not  constitute  as 
numerous  a  class  as  they  became  in  historic  times. 


SOCIETY  IN   THE  HEROIC  AGE.  99 

In  the  family,  the  wife  held  a  much  more  honored  position  than 
she  occupied  in  later  times.  The  charming  story  of  the  constant 
Penelope,  which  we  find  in  the  Odyssey,  assures  us  that  the  Ho- 
meric age  cherished  a  chivalric  feeling  for  woman. 

In  all  ranks  of  society,  life  was  marked  by  a  sort  of  patriarchal 
simplicity.  Manual  labor  was  not  yet  thought  to  be  degrading. 
Ulysses  constructs  his  own  house  and  raft,  and  boasts  of  his  skill 
in  swinging  the  scythe  and  guiding  the  plow.  Spinning  and  weav- 
ing were  the  chief  occupations  of  the  women  of  all  classes. 

One  pleasing  and  prominent  virtue  of  the  age  was  hospitality. 
There  were  no  public  inns  in  those  times,  hence  a  sort  of  gentle 
necessity  compelled  the  entertainment  of  wayfarers.  The  hospi- 
tality accorded  was  the  same  free  and  impulsive  welcome  that  the 
Arab  sheik  of  to-day  extends  to  the  traveller  whom  chance  brings 
to  his  tent.  But  while  hospitable,  the  nobles  of  the  heroic  age 
were  often  cruel,  violent,  and  treacherous.  Homer  represents  his 
heroes  as  committing  without  a  blush  all  sorts  of  fraud  and  villa- 
nies.     Piracy  was  considered  an  honorable  occupation. 


FORTY-OARED    GREEK    BOAT.     (After  a  Vase   Painting.) 

Art  and  architecture  were  in  a  rudimentary  state.  Yet  some 
advance  had  been  made.  The  cities  were  walled,  and  the  pal- 
aces of  the  kings  possessed  a  certain  barbaric  splendor.  Coined 
money  was  unknown  j  wealth  was  reckoned  chiefly  in  flocks  and 
herds,  and  in  uncoined  metals.  The  art  of  writing  was  probably 
unknown,  at  least  there  is  no  certain  mention  of  it ;  and  sculpture 
could  not  have  been  in  an  advanced  state,  as  the  Homeric  poems 
make  no  mention  of  statues.    The  state  of  literature  is  shown  by 


100  THE  LEGENDARY,   OR  HEROIC  AGE. 

the  poems  of  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey :  before  the  close  of  the  age, 
epic  poetry  had  reached  a  perfection  beyond  which  it  has  never 
been  carried. 

Commerce  was  yet  in  its  infancy.  Although  the  Greeks  were  to 
become  a  great  maritime  people,  still  in  the  Homeric  age  they  had 
evidently  explored  the  sea  but  little.  The  Phoenicians  then  ruled 
the  waves.  The  Greeks  in  those  early  times  knew  scarcely  any- 
thing of  the  world  beyond  Greece  proper  and  the  neighboring 
islands  and  shores.  Scarcely  an  echo  of  the  din  of  life  from  the 
then  ancient  and  mighty  cities  of  Egypt  and  Chaldsea  seems  to 
have  reached  their  ears. 


INTR  OD  UC  TOR  Y.  101 


CHAPTER 'Xl:  •••"•'  •    v  J\^'S  U^ 

RELIGION  OF  THE   GREEKS. 

Introductory.  — Without  at  least  some  little  knowledge  of  the 
religious  ideas  and  institutions  of  the  ancient  Greeks,  we  should 
find  very  many  passages  of  their  history  wholly  unintelligible. 
Hence  a  few  remarks  upon  these  matters  will  be  in  place  here. 

Cosmography  of  the  Greeks.  —  The  Greeks  supposed  the  earth 
to  be,  as  it  appears,  a  plane,  circular  in  form  like  a  shield.  Around 
it  flowed  the  "  mighty  strength  of  the  ocean  river,"  a  stream  broad 
and  deep,  beyond  which  on  all  sides  lay  realms  of  Cimmerian 
darkness  and  terror.  The  heavens  were  a  solid  vault,  or  dome, 
whose  edge  shut  down  close  upon  the  earth.  Beneath  the  earth, 
reached  by  subterranean  passages,  was  Hades,  a  vast  region,  the 
realm  of  departed  souls.  Still  beneath  this  was  the  prison  Tarta- 
rus, a  pit  deep  and  dark,  made  fast  by  strong  gates  of  brass  and 
iron.  Sometimes  the  poets  represent  the  gloomy  regions  beyond 
the  ocean  stream  as  the  cheerless  abode  of  the  dead. 

The  sun  was  an  archer-god,  borne  in  a  fiery  chariot  up  and 
down  the  steep  pathway  of  the  skies.  Naturally  it  was  imagined 
that  the  regions  in  the  extreme  east  and  west,  which  were  bathed 
in  the  near  splendors  of  the  sunrise  and  sunset,  were  lands  of  de- 
light and  plenty.  The  eastern  was  the  favored  country  of  the 
Ethiopians,1  a  land  which  even  Zeus  himself  so  loved  to  visit  that 
often  he  was  found  absent  from  Olympus  when  sought  by  suppliants. 
The  western  region,  adjoining  the  ocean  stream,  formed  the  Ely- 
sian  Fields,  the  abodes  of  the  souls  of  heroes  and  of  poets.2 

1  There  was  also  a  western  division  of  these  people. 

2  These  conceptions,  it  will  be  understood,  belong  to  the  early  period  of 
Greek  mythology.   As  the  geographical  knowledge  of  the  Greeks  became  more 


102 


RELIGION   OF   THE    GREEKS. 


The  Olympian  Council. — There  were  twelve  members  of  the 
celestial  council,.,  six,  gods  and  as  many  goddesses.  The  male 
deities  were. Z^ us,  r.he  father  of  gods  and  men;  Poseidon,  ruler  of 
the  sea  ;• -ApO'lto,  or -.Phoebus,  the  god  of  light,  of  music,  and  of 
prophecy )  Ares,  the  god  of  war ;  Hephaestus,  the  deformed  god 
of  fire,  and  the  forger  of  the  thunderbolts  of  Zeus ;  Hermes,  the 
wing-footed  herald  of  the  celestials,  the  god  of  invention  and  com- 
merce, himself  a  thief  and  the  patron  of  thieves. 


THE   WORLD    ACCORDING   TO    HOMER. 

The  female  divinities  were  Hera,  the  proud  and  jealous  queen 
of  Zeus;  Athena,  or  Pallas,  —  who  sprang  full-grown  from  the 
forehead  of  Zeus,  —  the  goddess  of  wisdom,  and  the  patroness  of 
the  domestic  arts ;  Artemis,  the  goddess  of  the  chase ;  Aphrodite, 
the  goddess  of  love  and  beauty,  born  of  the  sea-foam  ;  Hestia,  the 


extended,  they  modified  considerably  the  topography  not  only  of  the  upper- 
world,  but  also  of  the  nether- world. 


LESSER  DEITIES  AND   MONSTERS.  103 

goddess  of  the  hearth  j  Demeter,  the  earth-mother,  the  goddess 
of  grains  and  harvests.1 

These  great  deities  were  simply  magnified  human  beings,  pos- 
sessing all  their  virtues,  and  often  their  weaknesses.  They  give 
way  to  fits  of  anger  and  jealousy.  "  Zeus  deceives,  and  Hera  is 
constantly  practising  her  wiles."  All  the  celestial  council,  at  the 
sight  of  Hephaestus  limping  across  the  palace  floor,  burst  into 
"  inextinguishable  laughter  "  ;  and  Aphrodite,  weeping,  moves  all 
to  tears.  They  surpass  mortals  rather  in  power,  than  in  size  of 
body.  They  can  render  themselves  visible  or  invisible  to  human 
eyes.  Their  food  is  ambrosia  and  nectar ;  their  movements  are 
swift  as  light.  They  may  suffer  pain  j  but  death  can  never  come 
to  them,  for  they  are  immortal.  Their  abode  is  Mount  Olympus 
and  the  airy  regions  above  the  earth. 

Lesser  Deities  and  Monsters.  —  Besides  the  great  gods  and 
goddesses  that  constituted  the  Olympian  council  there  was  an 
almost  infinite  number  of  other  deities,  celestial  personages,  and 
monsters  neither  human  nor  divine. 

Hades  (Pluto)  ruled  over  the  lower  realms ;  Dionysus  (Bac- 
chus) was  the  god  of  wine ;  the  goddess  Nemesis  was  the  pun- 
isher  of  crime,  and  particularly  the  queller  of  the  proud  and 
arrogant ;  vEolus  was  the  ruler  of  the  winds,  which  he  confined  in 
a  cave  secured  by  mighty  gates. 

There  were  nine  Muses,  inspirers  of  art  and  song.  The  Nymphs 
were  beautiful  maidens,  who  peopled  the  woods,  the  fields,  the 
rivers,  the  lakes,  and  the  ocean.  Three  Fates  allotted  life  and 
death,  and  three  Furies  (Eumenides  or  Erinnyes)  avenged  crime, 

1  The  Latin  names  of  these  divinities  are  as  follows:  Zeus  =  Jupiter; 
Poseidon  =  Neptune;  Apollo  =  Apollo ;  Ares  =  Mars;  Hephaestus  =  Vulcan; 
Hermes  =  Mercury;  Hera  =  Juno;  Athena  =  Minerva;  Artemis  =s  Diana; 
Aphrodite  =  Venus;  Hestia  =  Vesta;   Demeter  =  Ceres. 

These  Latin  names,  however,  are  not  the  equivalents  of  the  Greek  names, 
and  should  not  be  used  as  such.  The  mythologies  of  the  Hellenes  and 
Romans  were  as  distinct  as  their  languages.  Consult  Rawlinson's  Religions 
of  the  Ancient  World. 


104  RELIGION   OF   THE    GREEKS. 

especially  murder  and  unnatural  crimes.  The  Gorgons  were 
three  sisters,  with  hair  entwined  with  serpents.  A  single  gaze 
upon  them  chilled  the  beholder  to  stone.  Besides  these  there 
were  Scylla  and  Charybdis,  sea-monsters  that  made  perilous  the 
passage  of  the  Sicilian  Straits,  the  Centaurs,  the  Cyclops,  Cerberus, 
the  watch-dog  of  Hades,  and  a  thousand  others. 

Many  at  least  of  these  monsters  were  simply  personifications  of 
the  human  passions  or  of  the  malign  and  destructive  forces  of 
nature.  Thus,  the  Furies  were  the  embodiment  of  an  aroused  and 
accusing  conscience ;  the  Gorgons  were  tempests,  which  lash  the 
sea  into  a  fury  that  paralyzes  the  affrighted  sailor;  Scylla  and 
Charybdis  were  dangerous  whirlpools  off  the  coast  of  Sicily.  To 
the  common  people  at  least,  however,  they  were  real  creatures, 
with  all  the  parts  and  habits  given  them  by  the  poets. 

Modes  of  Divine  Communication.  —  In  the  early  ages  the  gods 
were  wont,  it  was  believed,  to  visit  the  earth  and  mingle  with  men. 
But  even  in  Homer's  time  this  familiar  intercourse  was  a  thing 
of  the  past  —  a  tradition  of  a  golden  age  that  had  passed  away. 
Their  forms  were  no  longer  seen,  their  voices  no  longer  heard. 
In  these  later  and  more  degenerate  times  the  recognized  modes 
of  divine  communication  with  men  were  by  oracles,  and  by  casual 
and  unusual  sights  and  sounds,  as  thunder  and  lightning,  a  sudden 
tempest,  an  eclipse,  a  flight  of  birds, — particularly  of  birds  that 
mount  to  a  great  height,  as  these  were  supposed  to  know  the 
secrets  of  the  heavens,  —  the  appearance  or  action  of  the  sacrifi- 
cial victims,  or  any  strange  coincidence.  The  art  of  interpreting 
these  signs  or  omens  was  called  the  art  of  divination. 

Oracles.  —  But  though  the  gods  might  reveal  their  will  and  inten- 
tions through  signs  and  portents,  still  they  granted  a  more  special 
communication  of  counsel  through  what  were  known  as  orac/es. 
These  communications,  it  was  believed,  were  made  by  Zeus,  and 
especially  by  Apollo,  who  was  the  god  of  prophecy,  the  Revealer. 

Not  everywhere,  but  only  in  chosen  places,  did  these  gods  mani- 
fest their  presence  and  communicate  the  divine  will.  These 
favored  spots  were  called  oracles,  as  were  also  the  responses  there 


ORACLES.  105 

received.  There  were  twenty-two  oracles  of  Apollo  in  different 
parts  of  the  Grecian  world,  but  a  much  smaller  number  of  those 
of  Zeus.  These  were  usually  situated  in  wild  and  desolate  spots 
—  in  dark  forests  or  among  gloomy  mountains. 

The  most  renowned  of  the  oracles  was  that  of  the  Pelasgian 
Zeus  at  Dodona,  in  Epirus,  and  that  of  Apollo  at  ^)e|phir  in  Phocis. 
XrHodona  the  priests  listened  in  the  dark  forests  for  the  voice  of 
Zeus  in  the  rustling  leaves  of  the  sacred  oak.  At  Delphi  there 
was  a  deep  fissure  in  the  ground,  which  emitted  stupefying  vapors, 
that  were  thought  to  be  the  inspiring  breath  of  Apollo.  Over  the 
spot  was  erected  a  splendid  temple,  in  honor  of  the  oracle.  The 
revelation  was  generally  received  by  the  Pythia,  or  priestess,  seated 
upon  a  tripod  placed  over  the  orifice.  As  she  became  overpow- 
ered by  the  influence  of  the  prophetic  exhalations,  she  uttered  the 
message  of  the  god.  These  mutterings  of  the  Pythia  were  taken 
down  by  attendant  priests,  interpreted,  and  written  in  hexameter 
verse.  Sometimes  the  will  of  Zeus  was  communicated  to  the  pious 
seeker  by  dreams  and  visions  granted  to  him  while  sleeping  in  the 
temple  of  the  oracle. 

The  oracle  of  Delphi  gained  a  celebrity  wide  as  the  world  :   it 

often  consulted  by  the  monarchs  of  Asia  and  the  people  of 

Rome  in  times  of  extreme  danger  and  perplexity.     Among  the 

Greeks  scarcely  any  undertaking  was  entered  upon  without  the  will 

and  sanction  of  the  oracle  being  first  sought. 

Especially  true  was  this  in  the  founding  of  colonies.  Apollo 
was  believed  "  to  take  delight  in  the  foundation  of  new  cities." 
No  colony  could  prosper  that  had  not  been  established  under  the 
superintendence  of  the  Delphian  god. 

Some  of  the  responses  of  the  oracle  contained  plain  and  whole- 
some advice;  but  very  many  of  them,  particularly  those  that 
implied  a  knowledge  of  the  future,  were  obscure  and  ingeniously 
ambiguous,  so  that  they  might  correspond  with  the  event  however 
affairs  should  turn.  Thus,  Croesus  is  told  that,  if  he  undertake  an 
expedition  against  Persia,  he  will  destroy  a  great  empire.  He  did, 
indeed  ;  —  but  the  empire  was  his  own. 


106  RELIGION  OF  THE   GREEKS. 

The  Delphian  oracle  was  at  the  height  of  its  fame  before  the 
Persian  War  ;  in  that  crisis  it  did  not  take  a  bold  or  patriotic  stand, 
and  its  reputation  was  sensibly  impaired. 

Ideas  of  the  Future.  —  To  the  Greeks  life  was  so  bright  and 
joyous  a  thing  that  they  looked  upon  death#as  a  great  calamity. 
They  therefore  pictured  life  after  death,  except  in  the  case  of  a 
favored  few,  as  being  hopeless  and  aimless.1  The  Elysian  Fields, 
away  in  the  land  of  sunset,  were,  indeed,  filled  with  every  delight ; 
but  these  were  the  abode  only  of  the  great  heroes  and  benefactors 
of  the  race.  So  long  as  the  body  remained  unburied,  the  soul 
wandered  restless  in  Hades ;  hence  the  sacredness  of  the  rites  of 
sepulture. 

The  Sacred  Games.  — The  celebrated  games  of  the  Greeks  had 
their  origin  in  the  belief  of  their  Aryan  ancestors  that  the  souls 
of  the  dead  were  gratified  by  such  spectacles  as  delighted  them 
during  their  earthly  life.  During  the  Heroic  Age  these  festivals 
were  simply  sacrifices  or  games  performed  at  the  tomb,  or  about 
the  pyre  of  the  dead.  Gradually  these  grew  into  religious  festi- 
vals observed  by  an  entire  city  or  community,  and  were  celebrated 
near  the  oracle  or  shrine  of  the  god  in  whose  honor  they  were 
instituted ;  the  idea  now  being  that  the  gods  were  present  at  the 
festival,  and  took  delight  in  the  various  contests  and  exercises. 

Among  these  festivals,  four  acquired  a  world-wide  celebrity. 
These  were  the  Olympian,  celebrated  in  honor  of  Zeus,  at  Olympia, 
in  the  Peloponnesus ;  the  Pythian,  in  honor  of  Apollo,  near  his 
shrine  and  oracle  at  Delphi ;  the  Nemean,  in  honor  of  Zeus,  at 
Nemea;  and  the  Isthmian,  held  in  honor  of  Poseidon,  on  the 
isthmus  of  Corinth. 

The  Olympian  Games.  —  Of  these  four  festivals  the  Olympian 
secured  the  greatest  renown.     In  776  B.C.  Coroebus  was  victor  in 

1  Homer  makes  the  shade  of  the  great  Achilles  in  Hades  to  say :  — 

"  I  would  be 
A  laborer  on  earth,  and  serve  for  hire 
Some  man  of  mean  estate,  who  makes  scant  cheer, 
Rather  than  reign  o'er  all  who  have  gone  down 
To  death."  —  Od.  XI.  489-90  [Bryant's  Trans.]. 


INFLUENCE    OF  THE   GRECIAN  GAMES.  107 

the  foot-race  at  Olympia,  and  as  from  that  time  the  names  of  the 
victors  were  carefully  registered,  that  year  came  to  be  used  by  the 
Greeks  as  the  starting-point  in  their  chronology.  The  games  were 
held  every  fourth  year,  and  the  interval  between  two  successive 
festivals  was  known  as  an  Olympiad. 

The  contests  consisted  of  foot-races,  boxing,  wrestling,  and 
other  athletic  games.  Later,  chariot-racing  was  introduced,  and 
became  the  most  popular  of  all  the  contests.  The  competitors 
must  be  of  the  Hellenic  race  ;  and  must,  moreover,  be  unblemished 
by  any  crime  against  the  state  or  sin  against  the  gods.  Specta- 
tors from  all  parts  of  the  world  crowded  to  the  festival. 

The  victor  was  crowned  with  a  garland  of  wild  olive ;  heralds 
proclaimed  his  name  abroad ;  his  native  city  received  him  as  a 
conqueror,  sometimes  through  a  breach  made  in  the  city  walls  j 
his  statues,  executed  by  eminent  artists,  were  erected  at  Olympia 
and  in  his  own  city ;  sometimes  even  divine  honor  and  worship 
were  accorded  to  him ;  and  poets  and  orators  vied  with  the  artist 
in  perpetuating  the  name  and  deeds  of  him  who  had  reflected 
undying  honor  upon  his  native  state. 

Influence  of  the  Grecian  Games.  —  For  more  than  a  thousand 
years  these  national  festivals  exerted  an  immense  influence  upon 
the  literary,  social,  and  religious  life  of  Hellas.  They  enkindled 
among  the  widely  scattered  Hellenic  states  and  colonies  a  com- 
mon literary  taste  and  enthusiasm ;  for  into  all  the  four  great 
festivals,  excepting  the  Olympian,  were  introduced,  sooner  or  later, 
I  contests  in  poetry,  oratory,  and  history.  During  the  festivals, 
poets  and  historians  read  their  choicest  productions,  and  artists 
exhibited  their  masterpieces.  The  extraordinary  honors  accorded 
to  the  victors  stimulated  the  contestants  to  the  utmost,  and  strung 
to  the  highest  tension  every  power  of  body  and  mind.  To  this 
tfect  we  owe  some  of  the  grandest  productions  of  the  Greek  race. 

They  moreover  promoted  intercourse  and  trade ;  for  the  festi- 
vals became  great  centres  of  traffic  and  exchange  during  the 
continuance  of  the  games.  They  softened,  too,  the  manners  of 
the  people,  turning  their  thoughts  from  martial  exploits  and  giving 


108  RELIGION  OF  THE    GREEKS. 

the  states  respite  from  war ;  for  during  the  month  in  which  the  re- 
ligious games  were  held  it  was  sacrilegious  to  engage  in  military 
expeditions.  In  all  these  ways,  though  they  never  drew  the  states 
into  a  common  political  union,  still  they  did  impress  a  common 
character  upon  their  social,  intellectual,  and  religious  life. 

The  Amphictyonic  Council.  —  Closely  connected  with  the  re- 
ligious festivals  were  the  so-called  Amphictyonies,  or  "  leagues 
of  neighbors."  These  were  associations  of  a  number  of  cities  or 
tribes  for  the  celebration  of  religious  rites  at  some  shrine,  or  for 
the  protection  of  some  particular  temple. 

Pre-eminent  among  all  such  unions  was  that  known  as  the 
Delphic  Amphictyony,  or  simply  The  Amphictyony.  This  was  a 
league  of  twelve  of  the  sub-tribes  of  Hellas,  whose  main  object 
was  the  protection  of  the  Temple  of  Apollo  at  Delphi.  Another 
of  its  purposes  was,  by  humane  regulations,  to  mitigate  the  cruel- 
ties of  war. 

The  so-called  First  Sacred  War  (600-590  b.c.)  was  a  crusade 
of  ten  years  carried  on  by  the  Amphictyons  against  the  cities 
of  Crissa  and  Cirrha  for  their  robbery  of  the  treasures  of  the 
Delphian  temple.  The  cities  were  finally  taken,  levelled  to  the 
ground,  and  the  wrath  of  the  gods  invoked  upon  any  one  who 
should  dare  to  rebuild  them.  The  spoils  of  the  war  were  devoted 
to  the  establishment  of  musical  contests  in  honor  of  the  Delphian 
Apollo.  Thus  originated  the  renowned  Pythian  festivals,  to  which 
allusion  has  just  been  made. 


THE    TYRANTS.  109 


CHAPTER    XII. 

AGE  OF  THE  TYRANTS  AND  OF  COLONIZATION:  THE  EARLY 
GROWTH  OF  SPARTA  AND  OF  ATHENS. 

(776-500  B.C.) 

i.   Age  of  the  Tyrants  and  of  Colonization. 

The  Tyrants.  —  In  the  Heroic  Age  the  preferred  form  of  gov- 
ernment was  a  patriarchal  monarchy.  The  Iliad  says,  "  The  rule 
of  many  is  not  a  good  thing :  let  us  have  one  ruler  only,  —  one 
king,  —  him  to  whom  Zeus  has  given  the  sceptre."  But  by  the 
dawn  of  the  historic  period,  the  patriarchal  monarchies  of  the 
Achaean  age  had  given  place,  in  almost  all  the  Grecian  cities,  to 
oligarchies  or  aristocracies. 

The  Oligarchies  give  Way  to  Tyrannies.  —  The  nobles  into 
whose  hands  the  ancient  royal  authority  thus  passed  were  often 
divided  among  themselves,  and  invariably  opposed  by  the  common 
freemen,  who,  as  they  grew  in  intelligence  and  wealth,  naturally 
aspired  to  a  place  in  the  government.  The  issue  of  long  conten- 
tions was  the  overthrow  almost  everywhere  of  oligarchical  govern- 
ment and  the  establishment  of  the  rule  of  a  single  person. 

Usually  this  person  was  one  of  the  nobility,  who  held  himself 
out  as  the  champion  of  the  people,  and  who  with  their  help 
usurped  the  government.  One  who  had  thus  seized  the  govern- 
ment was  called  a  tyrant.  By  this  term  the  Greeks  did  not  mean 
one  who  rules  harshly,  but  simply  one  who  holds  the  supreme 
authority  in  the  state  illegally.  Some  of  the  Greek  Tyrants  were 
mild  and  beneficent  rulers,  though  too  often  they  were  all  that  the 
name  implies  among  us. 

But  the  Greeks  always  had  an  inextinguishable  hatred  of  arbi- 
trary rule  ;  consequently  the  Tyrannies  were,  as  a  rule,  short-lived, 


110  AGE   OF  THE    TYRANTS. 

rarely  lasting  longer  than  three  generations.  They  were  usually 
violently  overthrown,  and  the  old  oligarchies  re-established,  or 
democracies  set  up  in  their  place.  As  a  rule,  the  Dorian  cities 
preferred  oligarchical,  and  the  Ionian  cities  democratical,  govern- 
ment. The  so-called  Age  of  the  Tyrants  lasted  from  650  to 
500  B.C. 

Among  the  most  noted  of  the  Tyrants  were  the  Pisistratidae,  at 
Athens,  of  whom  we  shall  speak  hereafter ;  Periander  at  Corinth 
(625-585  B.C.),  who  was  a  most  cruel  ruler,  yet  so  generous  a 
patron  of  artists  and  literary  men  that  he  was  thought  worthy  of  a 
place  among  the  Seven  Sages ;  and  Polycrates,  Tyrant  of  Samos 
(535-522  B.C.),  who,  with  that  island  as  a  stronghold,  and  with  a 
fleet  of  a  hundred  war-galleys,  built  up  a  sort  of  maritime  king- 
dom in  the  iEgean,  and  for  the  space  of  more  than  a  decade 
enjoyed  such  astonishing  and  uninterrupted  prosperity,  that  it 
was  believed  his  sudden  downfall  and  death  —  he  was  allured  to 
the  Asian  shore  by  a  Persian  satrap,  and  crucified  —  were  brought 
about  by  the  envy  of  the  gods,1  who  the  Greeks  thought  were  apt 
to  be  jealous  of  over-prosperous  mortals. 

The  Founding  of  Colonies.  —  The  Age  of  the  Tyrants  coincides 
very  nearly  with  the  era  of  greatest  activity  in  the  founding  of  new 
colonies.  Thousands,  driven  from  their  homes,  like  the  Puritans 
in  the  time  of  the  Stuart  tyranny  in  England,  fled  over  the  seas, 
and,  under  the  direction  of  the  Delphian  Apollo,  laid  upon  remote 
and  widely  separated  shores  the  basis  of  "  Dispersed  Hellas." 
The  overcrowding  of  population  and  the  Greek  love  of  adventure 
also  contributed  to  swell  the  number  of  emigrants.     During  this 

1  Herodotus  tells  how  Amasis  of  Egypt,  the  friend  and  ally  of  the  Tyrant, 
becoming  alarmed  at  his  extraordinary  course  of  good  fortune,  wrote  him, 
begging  him  to  interrupt  it  and  disarm  the  envy  of  the  gods,  by  sacrificing  his 
most  valued  possession.  Polycrates,  acting  upon  the  advice,  threw  into  the 
sea  a  precious  ring,  which  he  highly  prized;  but  soon  afterwards  the  jewel 
was  found  by  his  servants  in  a  fish  that  a  fisherman  had  brought  to  the  palace 
as  a  present  for  Polycrates.  When  Amasis  heard  of  this,  he  at  once  broke  off 
his  alliance  with  the  Tyrant,  feeling  sure  that  he  was  fated  to  suffer  some  ter- 
rible reverse  of  fortune.     The  event  justified  his  worst  fears. 


*ya1heQ 


* 


"Knt^ 


"Pionc. 


''"nisia 


)  Sardinia 


"'IA'XP^ji 


7t>Ae  « 


J-eptia 


Selin 

hedgn 
Carthage) 


,  Akraga 
±eh»  Gel* 


GREECE 

and  the 

GREEK  COLONIES. 


Ionian „ -Hi 

-Dorian _ I      I 

OtAer  Greek  Sacea IZH 

Phoenician HI 


THE  FOUNDING   OF  COLONIES.  Ill 

colonizing  era  Southern  Italy  became  so  thickly  set  with  Greek 
cities  as  to  become  known  as  Magna  Grcecia,  "  Great  Greece." 
Here  were  founded  during  the  latter  part  of  the  eighth  century 
B.C.  the  important  Dorian  city  of  Tarentum ;  the  wealthy  and 
luxurious  Achaean  city  of  Sybaris  (whence  the  term  Sybarite, 
meaning  a  voluptuary)  j  the  Great  Crotona,  distinguished  for  its 
schools  of  philosophy  and  its  victors  in  the  Olympian  games. 

Upon  the  island  of  Sicily  was  planted,  by  the  Dorian  Corinth, 
the  city  of  Syracuse  (734  B.C.).  which,  before  Rome  had  become 
great,  waged  war  on  equal  terms  with  Carthage. 

In  the  Gulf  of  Lyons  was  established  about  600  B.C.  the  impor- 
tant Ionian  city  of  Massalia  (Marseilles),  the  radiating  point  of 
long  routes  of  travel  and  trade. 

On  the  African  coast  was  founded  the  great  Dorian  city  of 
Cyrene  (630  B.C.),  and  probably  about  the  same  time  was  estab- 
lished in  the  Nile  delta  the  city  of  Naucratis,  through  which  the 
civilization  of  Egypt  flowed  into  Greece. 

The  tide  of  emigration  flowed  not  only  to  the  west  and  south, 
but  to  the  north  as  well.  The  northern  shores  of  the  yEgean  and 
those  of  the  Hellespont  and  the  Propontis  were  fringed  with  colo- 
nies. The  Argonautic  terrors  of  the  Black  Sea  were  forgotten  or 
unheeded,  and  even  those  remote  shores  received  their  emigrants. 
Many  of  the  settlements  in  that  quarter  were  established  by  the 
Ionian  city  of  Miletus,  which,  swarming  like  a  hive,  became  the 
mother  of  more  than  eighty  colonies. 

Through  this  wonderful  colonizing  movement,  Greece  came  to 
hold  somewhat  the  same  place  in  the  ancient  Mediterranean 
world  that  England  as  a  colonizer  occupies  in  the  world  of  to- 
day. Many  of  these  colonies  not  only  reflected  honor  upon  the 
mother  land  through  the  just  renown  of  their  citizens,  but  through 
their  singularly  free,  active,  and  progressive  life,  they  exerted  upon 
her  a  most  healthful  and  stimulating  influence. 


112  AGE    OF  THE    TYRANTS. 

2.   The  Growth  of  Sparta. 

Situation  of  Sparta.  —  Sparta  was  one  of  the  cities  of  the 
Peloponnesus  which  owed  their  origin  or  importance  to  the 
Dorian  Invasion  (see  p.  96).  It  was  situated  in' the  deep  valley 
of  the  Eurotas,  in  Laconia,  and  took  its  name  Sparta  (sown  land) 
from  the  circumstance  that  it  was  built  upon  tillable  ground, 
whereas  the  heart  and  centre  of  most  Greek  cities  consisted  of  a 
lofty  rock  (the  citadel,  or  acropolis).  It  was  also  called  Lace- 
daemon,  after  an  early  legendary  king. 

Classes  in  the  Spartan  State.  —  In  order  to  understand  the 
social  and  political  institutions  of  the  Spartans,  we  must  first 
notice  the  three  classes  —  Spartans  (Spartiatse),  Periceci,  and 
Helots  —  into  which  the  population  of  Laconia  was  divided. 

The  Spartans  proper  were  the  descendants  of  the  Dorian  con- 
querors of  the  country.  They  composed  but  a  small  fraction  of 
the  entire  population.  Their  relations  to  the  conquered  people 
were  those  of  an  army  of  occupation.  Sparta,  their  capital,  was 
simply  a  vast  camp,  unprotected  by  any  walls  until  later  and 
degenerate  times.  The  martial  valor  of  its  citizens  was  thought 
its  only  proper  defence. 

The  Periceci  (dwellers -around),  who  constituted  the  second 
class,  were  the  subjugated  Achaeans.  They  were  allowed  to  retain 
possession  of  their  lands,  but  were  forced  to  pay  tribute,  and,  in 
times  of  war,  to  fight  for  the  glory  and  interest  of  their  Spartan 
masters. 

The  third  and  lowest  class  was  composed  of  slaves,  or  serfs, 
called  Helots.  The  larger  number  of  these  were  laborers  upon 
the  estates  of  the  Spartans.  They  were  the  property  of  the  state, 
and  not  of  the  individual  Spartan  lords,  among  whom  they  were 
distributed  by  lot.  Practically  they  had  no  rights  which  their 
Spartan  masters  felt  bound  to  respect.  It  is  affirmed  that  when 
they  grew  too  numerous  for  the  safety  of  the  state,  their  numbers 
were  thinned  by  a  deliberate  massacre  of  the  surplus  population. 

The  Legend  of  Lycurgus.  —  The  laws  and  customs  of  the  Spar- 


KINGS,    SENATE,  AND  ASSEMBLY.  113 

tans  have  excited  more  interest,  perhaps,  than  any  similar  institu- 
tions of  the  ancient  world.  A  mystery  and  halo  were  thrown  about 
them  by  their  being  attributed  to  the  creative  genius  of  a  single 
lawgiver,  Lycurgus. 

Lycurgus,  according  to  tradition,  lived  about  the  ninth  century 
B.C.  He  is  represented  as  acquainting  himself  with  the  laws  and 
institutions  of  different  lands,  by  converse  with  their  priests  and 
sages.  He  is  said  to  have  studied  with  great  zeal  the  laws  of 
Minos,  the  legendary  lawgiver  of  the  Cretans.  Like  the  great 
legislator  Moses,  he  became  learned  in  all  the  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptians. 

After  much  opposition,  a  system  of  laws  and  regulations  drawn 
up  by  Lycurgus  was  adopted  by  the  Spartan  people.  Then,  bind- 
ing his  countrymen  by  a  solemn  oath  that  they  would  carefully 
observe  his  laws  during  his  absence,  he  set  out  on  a  pilgrimage 
to  Delphi.  In  response  to  his  inquiry,  the  oracle  assured  him 
that  Sparta  would  endure  and  prosper  as  long  as  the  people 
obeyed  the  laws  he  had  given  them.  Lycurgus  caused  this 
answer  to  be  carried  to  his  countrymen ;  and  then,  that  they 
might  remain  bound  by  the  oath  they  had  taken,  he  resolved 
never  to  return.     He  went  into  an  unknown  exile. 

The  Kings,  the  Senate,  and  the  Popular  Assembly.  —  The  so- 
called  Constitution  of  Lycurgus  provided  for  two  joint  kings,  a 
Senate  of  Elders,  and  a  Popular  Assembly. 

The  two  kings  corresponded  in  some  respects  to  the  two  consuls 
in  the  later  Roman  republic.  One  served  as  a  check  upon  the 
other.  This  double  sovereignty  worked  admirably ;  for  five  cen- 
turies there  were  no  attempts  on  the  part  of  the  Spartan  kings  to 
subvert  the  constitution.  The  power  of  the  joint  kings,  it  should 
be  added,  was  rather  nominal  than  real  (save  in  time  of  war)  ; 
so  that  while  the  Spartan  government  was  monarchical  in  form,  it 
was  in  reality  an  aristocracy,  the  Spartans  corresponding  very 
closely  to  the  feudal  lords  of  Mediaeval  Europe. 

The  Senate  consisted  of  thirty  elders.  The  powers  of  this  body 
were  at  first  almost   unlimited.     After  a  time,  however,  officers 


114  THE   EARLY  GROWTH  OF  SPARTA. 

called  ephors  were  elected  by  the  Popular  Assembly,  and  these 
gradually  absorbed  the  powers  and  functions  of  the  Senate,  as  well 
as  the  authority  of  the  two  associate  kings. 

The  Popular  Assembly  was  composed  of  all  the  citizens  of 
Sparta  over  thirty  years  of  age.  By  this  body  laws  were  made, 
and  questions  of  peace  and  war  decided.  In  striking  contrast  to 
what  was  the  custom  at  Athens,  all  matters  were  decided  without 
debate.  The  Spartans  were  fighters,  not  talkers ;  they  hated  dis- 
cussion. 

Regulations  as  to  Lands  and  Money.  —  At  the  time  of  Lycur- 
gus  the  lands  of  Laconia  had  become  absorbed  by  the  rich,  leav- 
ing the  masses  in  poverty  and  distress.  It  is  certain  that  the 
lawgiver  did  much  to  remedy  this  ruinous  state  of  affairs.  Tradi- 
tion says  that  all  the  lands  were  redistributed,  an  equal  portion 
being  assigned  to  each  of  the  nine  thousand  Spartan  citizens,  and 
a  smaller  and  less  desirable  portion  to  each  of  the  thirty  thousand 
Perioeci,  —  but  it  is  not  probable  that  there  was  any  such  exact 
equalization  of  property. 

The  Spartans  were  forbidden  to  engage  in  trade  ;  all  their  time 
must  be  passed  in  the  chase,  or  in  gymnastic  and  martial  exercise. 
Iron  was  made  the  sole  money  of  the  state.  This,  according  to 
Plutarch,  "  was  of  great  size  and  weight,  and  of  small  value,  so  that 
the  equivalent  for  ten  minae  (about  $140)  required  a  great  room 
for  its  stowage,  and  a  yoke  of  oxen  to  draw  it."  The  object  of 
this,  he  tell  us,  was  to  prevent  its  being  used  for  the  purchase  of 
"  foreign  trumpery." 

The  Public  Tables.  — The  most  peculiar,  perhaps,  of  the  Lycur- 
gean  institutions  were  the  public  meals.  In  order  to  correct  the 
extravagance  with  which  the  tables  of  the  rich  were  often  spread, 
Lycurgus  ordered  that  all  the  Spartan  citizens  should  eat  at  public 
and  common  tables.  Excepting  the  ephors,  none,  not  even  the 
kings,  were  excused  from  sitting  at  the  common  mess.  One  of 
the  kings,  returning  from  a  long  expedition,  presumed  to  dine 
privately  with  his  wife,  but  received  therefor  a  severe  reproof. 

A  luxury-loving  Athenian,  once  visiting  Sparta  and  seeing  the 


EDUCATION  OF  THE    YOUTH.  115 

coarse  fare  of  the  citizens,  is  reported  to  have  declared  that  now 
he  understood  the  Spartan  disregard  of  life  in  battle.  "  Any  one," 
said  he,  "must  naturally  prefer  death  to  life  on  such  fare  as  this." 

Education  of  the  Youth.  —  Children  were  considered  as  belong- 
ing to  the  state.  Every  infant  was  brought  before  the  Council 
of  Elders ;  and  if  it  did  not  seem  likely  to  become  a  robust  and 
useful  citizen,  it  was  exposed  in  a  mountain  glen.  At  seven  the 
education  and  training  of  the  youth  were  committed  to  the  charge 
of  public  officers,  called  boy-trainers.  The  aim  of  the  entire 
course,  as  to  the  boys,  was  to  make  a  nation  of  soldiers  who  should 
despise  toil  and  danger  and  prefer  death  to  military  dishonor. 
Reading  and  writing  were  untaught,  and  the  art  of  rhetoric  was 
despised.  Spartan  brevity  was  a  proverb,  whence  our  word  laconic 
(from  Laconia),  implying  a  concise  and  pithy  mode  of  expression. 
Boys  were  taught  to  respond  in  the  fewest  words  possible.  At 
the  public  tables  they  were  not  permitted  to  speak  until  ques- 
tioned :  they  sat  "  silent  as  statues."  As  Plutarch  puts  it,  "  Lycur- 
gus  was  for  having  the  money  bulky,  heavy,  and  of  little  value ; 
and  the  language,  on  the  contrary,  very  pithy  and  short,  and  a 
great  deal  of  sense  compressed  in  a  few  words." 

But  before  all  things  else  the  Spartan  youth  was  taught  to  bear 
pain  unflinchingly.  Often  he  was  scourged  just  for  the  purpose  of 
accustoming  his  body  to  pain.  Frequently,  it  is  said,  boys  died 
under  the  lash,  without  betraying  their  suffering  by  look  or  moan. 

Another  custom  tended  to  the  same  end  as  the  foregoing  usage. 
The  boys  were  at  times  compelled  to  forage  for  their  food.  If 
detected,  they  were  severely  punished  for  having  been  so  unskilful 
as  not  to  get  safely  away  with  their  booty.  This  custom,  as  well 
as  the  fortitude  of  the  Spartan  youth,  is  familiar  to  all  through  the 
story  of  the  boy  who,  having  stolen  a  young  fox  and  concealed  it 
beneath  his  tunic,  allowed  the  animal  to  tear  out  his  vitals,  without 
betraying  himself  by  the  movement  of  a  muscle. 

The  Cryptia,  which  has  been  represented  as  an  organization  of 
young  Spartans  who  were  allowed,  as  a  means  of  rendering  them- 
selves ready  and  expert  in  war,  to  hunt  and  kill  the  Helots,  seems 


116  THE  EARLY   GROWTH   OF  SPARTA. 

in  reality  to  have  been  a  sort  of  police  institution,  designed  to 
guard  against  uprisings  of  the  serfs. 

Estimate  of  the  Spartan  Institutions. — That  the  laws  and 
regulations  of  the  Spartan  constitution  were  admirably  adapted  to 
the  end  in  view,  —  the  rearing  of  a  nation  of  skilful  and  resolute 
warriors,  —  the  long  military  supremacy  of  Sparta  among  the  states 
of  Greece  abundantly  attests.  But  when  we  consider  the  aim  and 
object  of  the  Spartan  institutions,  we  must  pronounce  them  low 
and  unworthy.  The  true  order  of  things  was  just  reversed  among 
the  Lacedaemonians.  Government  exists  for  the  individual :  at 
Sparta  the  individual  lived  for  the  state.  The  body  is  intended  to 
be  the  instrument  of  the  mind :  the  Spartans  reversed  this,  and 
attended  to  the  education  of  the  mind  only  so  far  as  its  devel- 
opment enhanced  the  effectiveness  of  the  body  as  a  weapon  in 
warfare. 

Spartan  history  teaches  how  easy  it  is  for  a  nation,  like  an  indi- 
vidual, to  misdirect  its  energies  —  to  subordinate  the  higher  to 
the  lower.  It  illustrates,  too,  the  fact  that  only  those  nations  that 
labor  to  develop  that  which  is  best  and  highest  in  man  make  help- 
ful contributions  to  the  progress  of  the  world.  Sparta,  in  signifi- 
cant contrast  to  Athens,  bequeathed  nothing  to  posterity. 

The  Messenian  Wars.  —  The  most  important  event  in  Spartan 
history  between  the  age  of  Lycurgus  and  the  commencement  of 
the  Persian  War  was  the  long  contest  with  Messenia,  known  as  the 
First  and  Second  Messenian  Wars  (about  750-650  B.C.).  Mes- 
senia was  one  of  the  districts  of  the  Peloponnesus  which,  like 
Laconia,  had  been  taken  possession  of  by  the  Dorians  at  the  time 
of  the  great  invasion. 

It  is  told  that  the  Spartans,  in  the  second  war,  falling  into 
despair,  sent  to  Delphi  for  advice.  The  oracle  directed  them  to 
ask  Athens  for  a  commander.  The  Athenians  did  not  wish  to  aid 
the  Lacedaemonians,  yet  dared  not  oppose  the  oracle.  So  they  sent 
Tyrtaeus,  a  poet-schoolmaster,  who  they  hoped  and  thought  would 
prove  of  but  little  service  to  Sparta.  Whatever  truth  there  may 
be  in  this  part  of  the  story,  it  seems  indisputable  that  during  the 


GROWTH   OF   THE  POWER   OF  SPARTA.  117 

Second  Messenian  War,  Tyrtaeus,  an  Attic  poet,  reanimated  the 
drooping  spirits  of  the  Spartans  by  the  energy  of  his  martial  strains. 
Perhaps  it  would  not  be  too  much  to  say  that  Sparta  owed  her  final 
victory  to  the  inspiring  songs  of  this  martial  poet. 

The  conquered  Messenians  were  reduced  to  serfdom,  and  their 
condition  made  as  degrading  and  bitter  as  that  of  the  Helots 
of  Laconia.  Many,  choosing  exile,  pushed  out  into  the  western 
seas  in  search  of  new  homes.  Some  of  the  fugitives  founded 
Rhegium,  in  Italy ;  others,  settling  in  Sicily,  gave  name  and  im- 
portance to  the  still  existing  city  of  Messina. 

Growth  of  the  Power  of  Sparta.  —  After  having  secured  pos- 
session of  Messenia,  Sparta  conquered  the  southern  part  of  Argolis. 
All  the  southern  portion  of  the  Peloponnesus  was  now  subject  to 
her  commands. 

On  the  north,  Sparta  extended  her  power  over  many  of  the  vil- 
lages, or  townships,  of  Arcadia ;  but  her  advance  in  this  direction 
having  been  checked  by  Tegea,  one  of  the  few  important  Arcadian 
cities,  Sparta  entered  into  an  alliance  with  that  city,  which  ever 
after  remained  her  faithful  friend  and  helper.  This  alliance  was 
one  of  the  main  sources  of  Spartan  preponderance  in  Greece 
during  the  next  hundred  years  and  more. 

Sparta  was  now  the  most  powerful  state  in  the  Peloponnesus. 
Her  fame  was  spread  even  beyond  the  limits  of  Hellas.  Croesus, 
king  of  Lydia,  sought  an  alliance  with  her  in  his  unfortunate  war 
with  Persia,  which  just  now  was  the  rising  power  in  Asia. 

3.  The  Growth  of  Athens. 

The  Attic  People.  —  The  population  of  Attica  in  historic  times 
was  essentially  Ionian  in  race,  but  there  were  in  it  strains  of  other 
Hellenic  stocks,  besides  some  non-Hellenic  elements  as  well. 
This  mixed  origin  of  the  population  is  believed  to  be  one  secret 
of  the  versatile  yet  well-balanced  character  which  distinguished 
the  Attic  people  above  all  other  branches  of  the  Hellenic  family. 
It  ifl  not  the  absolutely  pure,  but  the  mixed  races,  like  the  English 
people,  that  have  made  the  largest  contributions  to  civilization. 


118 


THE    GROWTH   OF  ATHENS. 


The  Site  of  Athens.  —  Four  or  five  miles  from  the  sea,  a  flat- 
topped  rock,  about  one  thousand  feet  in  length  and  half  as  many 
in  width,  rises  with  abrupt  cliffs,  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  above 
the  level  of  the  plains  of  Attica.  The  security  afforded  by  this 
eminence  doubtless  led  to  its  selection  as  a  stronghold  by  the  early 
Attic  settlers.  Here  a  few  buildings,  perched  upon  the  summit  of 
the  rock  and  surrounded  by  a  palisade,  constituted  the  beginning 
of  the  capital  whose  fame  has  spread  over  all  the  world. 

The  Kings  of  Athens.  —  During  the  Heroic  Age  Athens  was 
ruled  by  kings,  like  all  the  other  Grecian  cities.  The  names  of 
Theseus  and  Codrus  are  the  most  noted  of  the  regal  line. 


THE  ACROPOLIS   AT  ATHENS.     (From  a  Photograph.) 

To  Theseus  tradition  ascribed  the  work  of  uniting  the  different 
Attic  villages,  or  cantons,  twelve  in  number,  into  a  single  city,  on 
the  seat  of  the  ancient  Cecropia  (see  p.  92).  This  prehistoric 
union,  however  or  by  whomsoever  effected,  laid  the  basis  of  the 
greatness  of  Athens. 

Respecting  Codrus,  the  following  legend  is  told :  At  one  time 
the  Dorians  from  the  Peloponnesus  invaded  Attica.  Codrus  hav- 
ing learned  that  an  oracle  had  assured  them  of  success  if  they 
spared  the  life  of  the  Athenian  king,  disguised  himself,  and,  with 
a  single  companion,  made  an  attack  upon  some  Spartan  soldiers, 


THE  ARCHONS.  119 

who  instantly  slew  him.  Discovering  that  the  king  of  Athens  had 
fallen  by  a  Lacedaemonian  sword,  the  Spartans  despaired  of  taking 
the  city,  and  withdrew  from  the  country. 

The  Archons  (io5o?-6i2  b.c). —  Codrus  was  the  last  king  of 
Athens.  His  successor,  elected  by  the  nobles,  was  given  simply 
the  name  of  Archon,  or  Ruler,  for  the  reason,  it  is  said,  that  no 
one  was  thought  worthy  to  bear  the  title  of  the  divine  Codrus. 
The  real  truth  is,  that  the  nobles  were  transforming  the  Homeric 
monarchy  into  an  oligarchy,  and  to  effect  the  change  were  taking 
away  from  the  king  his  royal  powers.  At  the  outset  there  was  but 
one  Archon,  elected  for  life ;  later,  there  were  nine,  chosen 
annually. 

Throughout  these  early  times  the  government  was  in  the  hands 
of  the  nobles ;  the  people,  that  is,  the  free  farmers  and  artisans, 
having  no  part  in  the  management  of  public  affairs.  The  people 
at  length  demanded  a  voice  in  the  government,  or  at  least  legal 
protection  from  the  exactions  and  cruelties  of  the  wealthy. 

The  Laws  of  Draco  (about  620  b.c). — To  meet  these  de- 
mands, the  nobles  appointed  one  of  their  own  number,  Draco,  to 
prepare  a  code  of  laws.  He  reduced  existing  customs  and  regu- 
lations to  a  definite  and  written  constitution,  assigning  to  the 
smallest  offence  the  penalty  of  death.  This  cruel  severity  of  the 
Draconian  laws  caused  an  Athenian  orator  to  say  of  them  that 
"  they  were  written,  not  in  ink,  but  in  blood."  But  for  their 
harshness  Draco  was  not  responsible  :  he  did  not  make  them ; 
their  severity  was  simply  a  reflection  of  the  harshness  of  those 
early  times. 

The  Rebellion  of  Cylon  (612  b.c).  —  Soon  after  the  enactment 
of  Draco's  laws,  which  naturally  served  only  to  increase  the  dis- 
content of  the  people,  Cylon,  a  rich  and  ambitious  noble,  taking 
advantage  of  the  state  of  affairs,  attempted  to  overthrow  the  gov- 
ernment and  make  himself  supreme.  He  seized  the  citadel  of  the 
Acropolis,  where  he  was  closely  besieged  by  the  Archons.  Finally 
the  Archon  Megacles  offered  the  insurgents  their  lives  on  condi- 
tion of  surrender.     They  accepted  the  offer,  but  fearing  to  trust 


120  THE   GROWTH  OF  ATHENS. 

themselves  among  their  enemies  without  some  protection,  fastened 
a  string  to  a  statue  of  Athena,  and  holding  fast  to  this,  descended 
from  the  citadel,  into  the  streets  of  Athens.  As  they  came  in 
front  of  the  altars  of  the  Furies,  the  line  broke ;  and  Megacles, 
professing  to  believe  that  this  mischance  indicated  that  the  god- 
dess refused  to  shield  them,  caused  them  to  be  set  upon  and 
massacred. 

The  people  were  alarmed  lest  the  fierce  anger  of  the  avenging 
Furies  had  been  incurred  by  the  slaughter  of  prisoners  in  violation 
of  a  sacred  oath  and  before  their  very  altars.  Calamities  that  now 
befell  the  state  deepened  their  apprehension.  Thus  the  people 
were  inflamed  still  more  against  the  aristocracy.  They  demanded 
and  finally  secured  the  banishment  of  the  Alcmaeonidae,  the  family 
to  which  Megacles  belonged.  Even  the  bones  of  the  dead  of  the 
family  were  dug  up,  and  cast  beyond  the  frontiers.  The  people 
further  insisted  upon  a  fresh  revision  of  the  laws  and  a  share  in 
the  government. 

The  Laws  of  Solon  (594  b.c).  —  Solon,  a  man  held  in  great 
esteem  by  all  classes,  was  chosen  to  draw  up  a  new  code  of  laws. 
He  repealed  many  of  the  cruel  laws  of  Draco;  permitted  the 
return  of  persons  driven  into  exile  ;  gave  relief  to  the  debtor  class, 
especially  to  the  poor  farmers,  whose  little  plots  were  covered 
with  mortgages,  by  reducing  the  value  of  the  money  in  which  they 
would  have  to  make  payment ;  ordered  those  held  in  slavery  for 
debt  to  be  set  free ;  and  cancelled  all  fines  payable  to  the  state. 
These  measures  caused  contentment  and  prosperity  to  take  the 
place,  everywhere  throughout  Attica,  of  previous  discontent  and 
wretchedness. 

Changes  in  the  Athenian  Constitution.  — The  changes  wrought 
by  Solon  in  the  political  constitution  of  Athens  were  equally  wise 
and  beneficent.  He  divided  all  the  citizens  of  Athens  into  four 
classes,  according  to  their  income.  Only  members  of  the  first 
class  could  hold  the  office  of  Archon  j  and  only  those  of  the  first 
three  classes  were  eligible  to  the  Council  of  Elders  \  but  every  mem- 
ber of  all  the  classes  had  the  right  to  vote  in  the  popular  assembly. 


TRIBUNAL    OF   THE  AREOPAGUS.  121 

Thus  property  instead  of  birth  was  made  the  basis  of  political 
rights.  This  completely  changed  the  character  of  the  government ; 
it  was  no  longer  an  exclusive  oligarchy. 

A  council  known  as  the  Council  of  the  Four  Hundred  was 
created  by  Solon.  Its  chief  duties  were  to  decide  what  matters 
might  be  discussed  by  the  public  assembly,  and  to  execute  the 
resolutions  of  that  body. 

The  Tribunal  of  the  Areopagus.  —  Solon  also  enlarged  the  juris- 
diction of  the  celebrated  Tribunal  of  the  Areopagus,  a  venerable 
council  that  from  time  out  of  memory  had  been  held  on  the  Areopa- 
gus, or  Mars'  Hill,  near  the  Acropolis.  The  judges  sat  beneath  the 
open  sky,  that  they  might  not  be  contaminated,  it  is  said,  by  the 
breath  of  the  criminals  brought  before  them.  To  this  court  was 
committed  the  care  of  morals  and  religion.  It  was  in  the  pres- 
ence of  this  venerable  tribunal,  six  hundred  years  after  Solon's 
time,  that  Paul  stood  when  he  made  his  eloquent  defence  of 
Christianity. 

The  Public  Assembly.  —  The  public  assembly,  under  the  con- 
stitution of  Solon,  was  made  the  most  important  of  all  the  institu- 
tions of  the  state.  It  was  the  fountain  of  all  power.  Contrary  to 
the  rule  in  Sparta,  any  citizen  had  the  right  not  only  of  voting,  but 
of  speaking  on  any  question  which  the  assembly  had  a  right  to 
discuss.  Six  thousand  citizens  were  required  to  constitute  a 
quorum  to  transact  business  in  cases  of  special  importance.  This 
popular  assembly  grew  into  vast  importance  in  later  times.  By  it 
were  discussed  and  decided  questions  affecting  the  entire  Hellenic 
world. 

These  laws  and  institutions  of  Solon  laid  the  basis  of  the  Athe- 
nian democracy. 

The  Tyrant  Pisistratus  (560-527  B.C.).  —  Solon  had  the  mis- 
fortune of  living  to  see  his  institutions  used  to  set  up  a  tyranny,  by 
an  ambitious  kinsman,  his  nephew  Pisistratus.  This  man  courted 
popular  favor,  and  called  himself  the  "  friend  of  the  people."  One 
day,  having  inflicted  many  wounds  upon  himself,  he  drove  his 
chariot  hastily  into  the  public  square,  and  pretended  that  he  had 


122  THE    GROWTH  OF  ATHENS. 

been  thus  set  upon  by  the  nobles,  because  of  his  devotion  to  the 
people's  cause.  The  people,  moved  with  sympathy  and  indigna- 
tion, voted  him  a  guard  of  fifty  men.  Under  cover  of  raising  this 
company,  Pisistratus  gathered  a  much  larger  force,  seized  the 
Acropolis,  and  made  himself  master  of  Athens.  Though  twice 
expelled  from  the  city,  he  as  often  returned,  and  finally  succeeded 
in  getting  a  permanent  hold  of  the  government. 

The  rule  of  the  usurper  was  mild,  and  under  him  Athens  en- 
joyed a  period  of  great  prosperity.  He  adorned  the  city  with 
temples  and  other  splendid  buildings,  and  constructed  great  aque- 
ducts. Just  beyond  the  city  walls,  he  laid  out  the  Lyceum,  a  sort 
of  public  park,  which  became  in  after  years  the  favorite  resort  of 
the  philosophers  and  poets  of  Athens.  He  was  a  liberal  patron 
of  literature ;  and  caused  the  Homeric  poems  to  be  collected  and 
edited.  He  died  527  B.C.,  thirty- three  years  after  his  first  seizure 
of  the  citadel.  Solon  himself  said  of  him  that  he  had  no  vice 
save  ambition. 

Expulsion  of  the  Tyrants  from  Athens  (510  b.c).  —  The  two 
sons  of  Pisistratus,  Hippias  and  Hipparchus,  succeeded  to  his 
power.  At  first  they  emulated  the  example  of  their  father,  and 
Athens  flourished  under  their  parental  rule.  But  at  length  an 
unfortunate  event  gave  an  entirely  different  tone  to  the  govern- 
ment. Hipparchus,  having  insulted  a  young  noble,  was  assassi- 
nated. Hippias  escaped  harm,  but  the  event  caused  him  to 
become  suspicious  and  severe.  His  rule  now  became  a  tyranny 
indeed,  and  was  brought  to  an  end  in  the  following  way. 

After  his  last  return  to  Athens,  Pisistratus  had  sent  the  "ac- 
cursed "  Alcmaeonidae  into  a  second  exile.  During  this  period 
of  banishment  an  opportunity  arose  for  them  to  efface  the  stain  of 
sacrilege  which  was  still  supposed-  to  cling  to  them  on  account 
of  the  old  crime  of  Megacles.  The  temple  at  Delphi  having  been 
destroyed  by  fire,  they  contracted  with  the  Amphictyons  to  rebuild 
it.  They  not  only  completed  the  work  in  the  most  honorable 
manner  throughout,  but  even  went  so  far  beyond  the  terms  of  their 
contract  as  to  use  beautiful  Parian  marble  for  the  front  of  the 


THE  REFORM  OF  CLISTHENES.  123 

temple,  when  only  common  stone  was  required  by  the  specifi- 
cations. 

By  this  act  the  exiled  family  won  to  such  a  degree  the  favor 
of  the  priests  of  the  sacred  college,  that  they  were  able  to  influ- 
ence the  utterances  of  the  oracle.  The  invariable  answer  now  of 
the  Pythia  to  Spartan  inquirers  at  the  shrine  was,  "  Athens  must 
be  set  free." 

Moved  at  last  by  the  repeated  injunctions  of  the  oracle,  the 
Spartans  resolved  to  drive  Hippias  from  Athens.  Their  first  at- 
tempt was  unsuccessful ;  but  in  a  second  they  were  so  fortunate  as 
to  capture  the  two  children  of  the  tyrant,  who,  to  secure  their  re- 
lease, agreed  to  leave  the  city  (510  B.C.).  He  retired  to  Asia 
Minor,  and  spent  the  rest  of  his  life,  as  we  shall  learn  hereafter, 
seeking  aid  in  different  quarters  to  re-establish  his  tyranny  in 
Athens.  The  Athenians  passed  a  decree  of  perpetual  exile  against 
him  and  all  his  family. 

The  Reforms  of  Clisthenes  (509  b.c).  —  Straightway  upon  the 
expulsion  of  the  Tyrant  Hippias,  there  arose  a  great  strife  between 
the  people,  who  of  course  wished  to  organize  the  government  in 
accord  with  the  constitution  of  Solon,  and  the  nobles,  who  desired 
to  re-establish  the  old  aristocratical  rule.  Clisthenes,  an  aristo- 
crat, espoused  the  cause  of  the  popular  party.  Through  his  influ- 
ence several  important  changes  in  the  constitution,  which  rendered 
it  still  more  democratical  than  under  Solon,  were  now  effected. 

Athenian  citizenship  was  conferred  upon  all  the  free  inhabitants 
of  Attica.  This  made  such  a  radical  change  in  the  constitution 
in  the  interest  of  the  masses,  that  Clisthenes  rather  than  Solon  is 
regarded  by  many  as  the  real  founder  of  the  Athenian  democracy. 

Ostracism.  —  But  of  all  the  innovations  or  institutions  of  Clis- 
thenes, that  known  as  ostracism  was  the  most  characteristic.  By 
means  of  this  process  any  person  who  had  excited  the  suspicions 
or  displeasure  of  the  people  could,  without  trial,  be  banished  from 
Athens  for  a  period  of  ten  years.  Six  thousand  votes  cast  against 
any  person  in  a  meeting  of  the  popular  assembly  was  a  decree  of 
banishment.     The  name  of  the  person  whose   banishment   was 


124  THE   GROWTH  OF  ATHENS. 

sought  was  written  on  a  piece  of  pottery  or  a  shell  (in  Greek 
ostrako?i),  hence  the  term  ostracism. 

The  original  design  of  this  institution  was  to  prevent  the  recur- 
rence of  such  a  usurpation  as  that  of  the  Pisistratidae.  The  priv- 
ilege and  power  it  gave  the  people  were  often  abused,  and  many 
of  the  ablest  and  best  statesmen  of  Athens  were  sent  into  exile 
through  the  influence  of  some  demagogue  who  for  the  moment 
had  caught  the  popular  ear. 

No  stigma  or  disgrace  attached  to  the  person  ostracized.  The 
vote  came  to  be  employed,  as  a  rule,  simply  to  settle  disputes 
between  rival  leaders  of  political  parties.  Thus  the  vote  merely 
expressed  political  preference,  the  ostracized  person  being  simply 
the  defeated  candidate  for  popular  favor. 

The  institution  was  short-lived.  It  was  resorted  to  for  the  last 
time  during  the  Peloponnesian  War  (417  B.C.).  The  people  then, 
in  a  freak,  ostracized  a  man  whom  all  admitted  to  be  the  meanest 
man  in  Athens.  This  was  regarded  as  such  a  degradation  of  the 
institution,  as  well  as  such  an  honor  to  the  mean  man,  that  never 
thereafter  did  the  Athenians  degrade  a  good  man,  or  honor  a  bad 
one,  by  a  resort  to  the  measure. 

Sparta  opposes  the  Athenian  Democracy.  —  The  aristocratic 
party  at  Athens  was  naturally  bitterly  opposed  to  all  these  demo- 
cratic innovations.  The  Spartans,  also,  viewed  with  disquiet  and 
jealousy  this  rapid  growth  of  the  Athenian  democracy,  and  tried 
to  overthrow  the  new  government  and  restore  Hippias  to  power. 
But  they  did  not  succeed  in  their  purpose,  and  Hippias  went  away 
to  Persia  to  seek  aid  of  King  Darius.  His  solicitations,  in  con- 
nection with  an  affront  which  the  Athenians  just  now  offered  the 
king  himself  by  aiding  his  revolted  subjects  in  Ionia,  led  directly 
up  to  the  memorable  struggle  known  as  the  Graeco- Persian  wars. 


EXPEDITIONS   OF  DARIUS. 


125 


GREEK   WARRIORS   PREPARING    FOR    BATTLE. 


CHAPTER    XIII. 


THE  GRvECO-PERSIAN   WARS. 


(5OO-479  B.C.) 

Expeditions  of  Darius  against  Greece.  —  In  narrating  the  his- 
tory of  the  Persians,  we  told  how  Darius,  after  having  subdued  the 
revolt  of  his  Ionian  subjects  in  Asia  Minor,  turned  his  armaments 
against  the  European  Greeks,  to  punish  them  for  the  part  they  had 
taken  in  the  capture  and  burning  of  Sardis.  It  will  be  recalled 
how  ill-fated  was  his  first  expedition,  which  was  led  by  his  son-in 
law  Mardonius  (see  p.  80). 

Undismayed  by  this  disaster,  Darius  issued  orders  for  the  rais- 
ing and  equipping  of  another  and  stronger  armament.  Meanwhile 
he  sent  heralds  to  the  various  Grecian  states  to  demand  earth  and 
water,  which  elements  among  the  Persians  were  symbols  of  submis- 
sion. The  weaker  states  gave  the  tokens  required ;  but  the  Athe- 
nians and  Spartans  threw  the  envoys  of  the  king  into  pits  and  wells, 
and  bade  them  help  themselves  to  earth  and  water.  By  the  begin- 
ning of  the  year  490  B.C.,  another  Persian  army  of  1 20,000  men 


126  THE   GRjECO-PERSIAN   WARS. 

had  been  mustered  for  the  second  attempt  upon  Greece.  This 
armament  was  intrusted  to  the  command  of  the  experienced  gen- 
erals Datis  and  Artaphernes ;  but  was  under  the  guidance  of  the 
traitor  Hippias.  A  fleet  of  six  hundred  ships  bore  the  army  from 
the  coasts  of  Asia  Minor  over  the  ^Egean  towards  the  Grecian 
shores. 

After  receiving  the  submission  of  the  most  important  of  the 
Cyclades,  and  capturing  and  sacking  the  city  of  Eretria  upon  the 
island  of  Euboea,  the  Persians  landed  at  Marathon,  barely  two  days' 
journey  from  Athens.  Here  is  a  sheltered  bay,  which  is  edged  by 
a  crescent-shaped  plain,  backed  by  the  rugged  ranges  of  Parnes 
and  Pentelicus.  Upon  this  level  ground  the  Persian  generals 
drew  up  their  army,  flushed  and  confident  with  their  recent  suc- 
cesses. 

The  Battle  of  Marathon  (490  B.C.). —  The  Athenians  were 
nerved  by  the  very  magnitude  of  the  danger  to  almost  superhuman 
energy.  Slaves  were  transformed  into  soldiers  by  the  promise  of 
liberty.  A  fleet  runner,  Phidippides  by  name,  was  despatched  to 
Sparta  for  aid.  In  just  thirty-six  hours  he  was  in  Sparta,  which  is 
one  hundred  and  fifty  miles  from  Athens.  But  it  so  happened  that 
it  lacked  a  few  days  of  the  full  moon,  during  which  interval  the 
Spartans,  owing  to  an  old  superstition,  were  averse  to  setting  out 
upon  a  military  expedition.  They  promised  aid,  but  moved  only 
in  time  to  reach  Athens  when  all  was  over.  The  Plataeans,  firm 
and  grateful  friends  of  the  Athenians,  on  account  of  some  former 
service,  no  sooner  received  the  latter's  appeal  for  help  than  they 
responded  to  a  man. 

The  Athenians  and  their  faithful  allies,  numbering  about  ten  thou- 
sand in  all,  under  the  command  of  Miltiades,  were  drawn  up  in 
battle  array  just  where  the  hills  of  Pentelicus  sink  down  into  the 
plain  of  Marathon.  The  vast  host  of  the  Persians  filled  the  level 
ground  in  their  front.  The  fate  of  Greece  and  the  future  of  Europe 
were  in  the  keeping  of  Miltiades  and  his  trusty  warriors.  Without 
waiting  for  the  attack  of  the  Persians,  the  Greeks  charged  and 
swept  like  a  tempest  from  the  mountain  over  the  plain,  pushed  the 


THE  BATTLE   OF  MARATHON.  127 

Persians  back  towards  the  shore,  and  with  great  slaughter  drove 
them  to  their  ships. 

Miltiades  at  once  despatched  a  courier  to  Athens  with  intelli- 
gence of  his  victory.  The  messenger  reached  the  city  in  a  few 
hours,  but  so  breathless  from  his  swift  run  that,  as  the  people 
thronged  eagerly  around  him  to  hear  the  news  he  bore,  he  could 
merely  gasp,  "  Victory  is  ours,"  and  fell  dead. 

But  the  danger  was  not  yet  past.  The  Persian  fleet,  instead  of 
returning  to  the  coast  of  Asia,  bore  down  upon  Athens.  Informed 
by  watchers  on  the  hills  of  the  movements  of  the  enemy,  Miltiades 
immediately  set  out  with  his  little  army  for  the  capital,  which  he 
reached  just  at  evening,  the  battle  at  Marathon  having  been  won 
in  the  forenoon  of  that  same  day.  The  next  morning,  when  the 
Persian  generals  would  have  made  an  attack  upon  the  city,  they 
found  themselves  confronted  by  the  same  men  who  but  yesterday 
had  beaten  them  back  from  the  plains  of  Marathon.  Shrinking 
from  another  encounter  with  these  citizen-soldiers  of  Athens,  the 
Persians  spread  their  sails,  and  bore  away  towards  the  Ionian 
shore. 

Thus  the  cloud  that  had  lowered  so  threateningly  over  Hellas 
was  for  a  time  dissipated.  The  most  imposing  honors  were  ac- 
corded to  the  heroes  who  had  achieved  the  glorious  victory,  and 
their  names  and  deeds  were  transmitted  to  posterity,  in  song  and 
marble.  And  as  the  gods  were  believed  to  have  interposed  in 
behalf  of  Greece,  suitable  recognition  of  their  favor  was  made  in 
gifts  and  memorials.  A  considerable  part  of  the  brazen  arms  and 
shields  gathered  from  the  battle-field  was  melted  into  a  colossal 
statue  of  Athena,  which  was  placed  upon  the  Acropolis,  as  the 
guardian  of  Athens. 

Results  of  the  Battle  of  Marathon. — The  battle  of  Marathon 
is  reckoned  as  one  of  the  "  decisive  battles  of  the  world."  It  marks 
an  epoch,  not  only  in  the  life  of  Greece,  but  in  that  of  Europe. 
Hellenic  civilization  was  spared  to  mature  its  fruit,  not  for  itself 
alone,  but  for  the  world.  The  battle  decided  that  no  longer  the 
despotism  of  the  East,  with  its  repression  of  all  individual  action, 


128  THE   GRjECO-PERSIAN   WARS. 

but  the  freedom  of  the  West,  with  all  its  incentives  to  personal 
effort,  should  control  the  affairs  and  mould  the  ideas  and  institu- 
tions of  the  future.  It  broke  the  spell  of  the  Persian  name,  and 
destroyed  forever  the  prestige  of  the  Persian  arms.  It  gave  the 
Hellenic  peoples  that  position  of  authority  and  pre-eminence  that 
had  been  so  long  enjoyed  by  the  successive  races  of  the  East.  It 
especially  revealed  the  Athenians  to  themselves.  The  conscious- 
ness of  resources  and  power  became  the  inspiration  of  their  future 
acts.  They  performed  great  deeds  thereafter  because  they  believed 
themselves  able  to  perform  them. 

Miltiades  falls  into  Disgrace.  —  The  distinguished  services 
Miltiades  had  rendered  his  country,  made  him  the  hero  of  the 
hour  at  Athens.  Taking  advantage  of  the  public  feeling  in  his  favor, 
he  persuaded  the  Athenians  to  put  in  his  hands  a  fleet  for  an  enter- 
prise respecting  the  nature  of  which  no  one  save  himself  was  to 
know  anything  whatever.  Of  course  it  was  generally  supposed 
that  he  meditated  an  attack  upon  the  Persians  or  their  allies,  and 
with  full  faith  in  the  judgment  as  well  as  in  the  integrity  of  their 
favorite,  the  Athenians  gave  him  the  command  he  asked. 

But  Miltiades  abused  the  confidence  imposed  in  him.  He  led 
the  expedition  against  the  island  of  Paros,  simply  to  avenge  some 
private  wrong.  The  undertaking  was  unsuccessful,  and  Miltiades, 
severely  wounded,  returned  to  Athens,  where  he  was  brought  to 
trial  for  his  conduct.  His  never-to-be-forgotten  services  at  Mara- 
thon pleaded  eloquently  for  him,  and  he  escaped  being  sentenced 
to  death,  but  was  subjected  to  a  heavy  fine.  This  he  was  unable 
to  pay,  and  in  a  short  time  he  died  of  his  wound.  The  unfortu- 
nate affair  left  an  ineffaceable  blot  upon  a  fame  otherwise  the  most 
resplendent  in  Grecian  story. 

Athens  prepares  for  Persian  Vengeance.  —  Many  among  the 
Athenians  were  inclined  to  believe  that  the  battle  of  Marathon 
had  freed  Athens  forever  from  the  danger  of  a  Persian  invasion. 
But  there  was  at  least  one  among  them  who  was  clear-sighted 
enough  to  see  that  that  battle  was  only  the  beginning  of  a  great 
struggle.     This  was  Themistocles,  a  sagacious,  versatile,  and  am- 


PREPARATIONS   TO  INVADE    GREECE.  129 

bitious  statesman,  who  labored  to  persuade  the  Athenians  to 
strengthen  their  navy,  in  order  to  be  ready  to  meet  the  danger  he 
foresaw. 

Themistocles  was  opposed  in  this  policy  by  Aristides,  called 
the  Just,  a  man  of  the  most  scrupulous  integrity,  who  feared  that 
Athens  would  make  a  serious  mistake  if  she  converted  her  land 
force  into  a  naval  armament.  The  contention  grew  so  sharp 
between  them  that  the  ostracism  was  called  into  use  to  decide 
the  matter.  Six  thousand  votes  were  cast  against  Aristides,  and 
he  was  sent  into  exile. 

It  is  related  that  while  the  vote  that  ostracized  him  was  being 
taken  in  the  popular  assembly,  an  illiterate  peasant,  who  was  a 
stranger  to  Aristides,  asked  him  to  write  the  name  of  Aristides 
upon  his  tablet.  As  he  placed  the  name  desired  upon  the  shell, 
the  statesman  asked  the  man  what  wrong  Aristides  had  ever  done 
him.  "  None,"  responded  the  voter ;  "  I  don't  even  know  him  ; 
but  I  am  tired  of  hearing  him  called  '  the  Just.'  " 

After  the  banishment  of  Aristides,  Themistocles  was  free  to 
carry  out  his  naval  policy  without  any  serious  opposition,  and 
soon  Athens  had  the  largest  fleet  of  any  Greek  city,  with  a  harbor 
at  Piraeus. 

Xerxes'  Preparations  to  invade  Greece.  —  No  sooner  had  the 
news  of  the  disaster  at  Marathon  been  carried  to  Darius  than  he 
began  to  make  gigantic  preparations  to  avenge  this  second  defeat 
and  insult.  It  was  in  the  midst  of  these  plans  for  revenge  that, 
as  we  have  already  learned,  death  cut  short  his  reign,  and  his  son 
Xerxes  came  to  the  throne  (see  p.  80). 

Urged  on  by  his  nobles,  as  well  as  by  exiled  Greeks  at  his  court, 
who  sought  to  gratify  ambition  or  enjoy  revenge  in  the  humiliation 
and  ruin  of  their  native  land,  Xerxes,  though  at  first  disinclined 
to  enter  into  a  contest  with  the  Greeks,  at  length  ordered  the 
preparations  begun  by  his  father  to  be  pushed  forward  with  the 
utmost  energy.  For  eight  years  all  Asia  resounded  with  the  din 
of  preparation.  Levies  were  made  upon  all  the  provinces  that 
acknowledged  the  authority  of  the  Great  King,  from  India  to  the 


130  THE   GRJECO-PERSIAN   WARS. 

Hellespont.  Vast  contingents  of  vessels  were  furnished  by  the 
coast  countries  of  the  Mediterranean.  Immense  stores  of  provis- 
ions, the  harvests  of  many  years,  were  gathered  into  great  store- 
houses along  the  intended  line  of  march. 

While  all  these  preparations  were  going  on  in-Asia  itself,  Phoe- 
nician and  Egyptian  architects  were  employed  in  spanning  the 
Hellespont  with  a  double  bridge  of  boats,  which  was  to  unite  the 
two  continents  as  with  a  royal  highway.  At  the  same  time,  the 
isthmus  at  Mount  Athos,  in  rounding  which  promontory  the  ad- 
mirals of  Mardonius  had  lost  their  fleet,  was  cut  by  a  canal,  traces 
of  which  may  be  seen  at  this  day.  Three  years  were  consumed  in 
these  gigantic  works.  With  them  completed,  or  far  advanced, 
Xerxes  set  out  from  his  capital  to  join  the  countless  hosts  that 
from  all  quarters  of  the  compass  were  gathering  at  Sardis,  in  Asia 
Minor. 

Disunion  of  the  Greeks:  Congress  at  Corinth  (481  b.c). — 
Startling  rumors  of  the  gigantic  preparations  that  the  Persian  king 
was  making  to  crush  them  were  constantly  borne  across  the  y£gean 
to  the  ears  of  the  Greeks  in  Europe.  Finally  came  intelligence 
that  Xerxes  was  about  to  begin  his  march.  Something  must  now 
be  done  to  meet  the  impending  danger.  Mainly  through  the 
exertions  of  Themistocles,  a  council  of  the  Greek  cities  was  con- 
vened at  Corinth  in  the  fall  of  481  b.c. 

But  on  account  of  feuds,  jealousies,  and  party  spirit,  only  a 
small  number  of  the  states  of  Hellas  could  be  brought  to  act 
in  concert.  Argos  would  not  join  the  proposed  confederation 
through  hatred  of  Sparta ;  Thebes,  through  jealousy  of  Athens. 
The  Cretans,  to  whom  an  embassy  had  been  sent  soliciting  aid, 
refused  all  assistance.  Gelon,  the  Tyrant  of  Syracuse,  offered  to 
send  over  a  large  armament,  provided  that  he  were  given  the 
chief  command  of  the  allied  forces.  His  aid  on  such  terms  was 
refused. 

Thus,  through  different  causes,  many  of  the  Greek  cities  held 
aloof  from  the  confederation,  so  that  only  about  fifteen  or  sixteen 
states  were  brought  to  unite  their  resources  against  the  Barbarians ; 


THE  UELLESPONTINE  BRIDGES  BROKEN.  131 

and  even  the  strength  of  many  of  those  cities  that  did  enter  into 
the  alliance  was  divided  by  party  spirit.  The  friends  of  aris- 
tocratical  government  were  almost  invariably  friends  of  Persia, 
because  a  Persian  victory  in  Greece  proper  meant  what  it  had 
already  meant  in  Ionia,  —  a  suppression  of  the  democracies  as 
incompatible  with  the  Persian  form  of  government.  Thus  for  the 
sake  of  a  party  victory,  the  aristocrats  were  ready  to  betray  their 
country  into  the  hands  of  the  Barbarians.  Furthermore,  the  Del- 
phian oracle,  aristocratical  in  its  sympathies,  was  luke-warm  and 
wavering,  if  not  actually  disloyal,  and  by  its  timid  responses,  dis- 
heartened the  patriot  party. 

But  under  the  inspiration  of  Themistocles  the  patriots  in  con- 
vention at  Corinth  determined  upon  desperate  resistance  to  the 
Barbarians.  It  was  at  first  decided  to  concentrate  a  strong  force 
in  the  Vale  of  Tempe,  and  at  that  point  to  dispute  the  advance 
of  the  enemy ;  but  this  being  found  impracticable,  it  was  resolved 
that  the  first  stand  against  the  invaders  should  be  made  at  the  pass 
of  Thermopylae. 

The  Spartans  were  given  the  chief  command  of  both  the  land 
and  the  naval  forces.  The  Athenians  might  fairly  have  insisted 
upon  their  right  to  the  command  of  the  allied  fleet,  but  they  patri- 
otically waived  their  claim,  for  the  sake  of  harmony. 

The  Hellespontine  Bridges  broken. — As  the  vast  army  of 
Xerxes  was  about  to  move  from  Sardis,  intelligence  came  that  the 
bridges  across  the  Hellespont  had  been  wrecked  by  a  violent  tem- 
pest. It  is  said  that  Xerxes,  in  great  wrath,  ordered  the  architects 
to  be  put  to  death,  and  the  sea  to  be  bound  with  fetters  and 
scourged.  The  scourgers  faithfully  performed  their  duty,  at  the 
same  time  gratuitously  cursing  the  traitorous  and  rebellious  Helles- 
pont with  what  Herodotus  calls  "  non-Hellenic  and  blasphemous 
terms." 

Other  architects  spanned  the  channel  with  two  stronger  and 
firmer  bridges.  Each  roadway  rested  upon  a  row  of  from  three 
to  four  hundred  vessels,  all  securely  anchored  like  modern  pon- 
toons.   The  bridges  were  each  about  one  mile  in  length,  and  fur- 


132  THE   GR&CO-PERSIAN   WARS. 

nished  with  high  parapets,  that  the  horses  and  cattle  might  not  be 
rendered  uneasy  at  sight  of  the  water. 

Passage  of  the  Hellespont.  —  With  the  first  indications  of  the 
opening  spring  of  480  B.C.,  just  ten  years  after  the  defeat  at  Mara- 
thon, the  vast  Persian  army  was  astir  and  concentrating  from  all 
points  upon  the  Hellespont.  The  passage  of  this  strait,  as  pictured 
to  us  in  the  inimitable  narration  of  Herodotus,  is  one  of  the  most 
dramatic  of  all  the  spectacles  afforded  by  history. 

Before  the  passage  commenced,  the  bridges  were  strewn  with 
the  sacred  myrtle  and  perfumed  with  incense  from  golden  censers, 
while  the  sea  was  placated  with  libations  poured  by  the  king  him- 
self. As  the  east  reddened  with  the  approach  of  day,  prayers 
were  offered,  and  the  moment  the  rays  of  the  sun  touched  the 
bridges  the  passage  began.  To  avoid  accidents  and  delays,  the 
trains  of  baggage  wagons  and  the  beasts  of  burden  crossed  by  one 
causeway,  leaving  the  other  free  for  the  march  of  the  army.  The 
first  of  the  host  to  cross  was  the  sacred  guard  of  the  Great  King, 
the  Ten  Thousand  Immortals,  all  crowned  with  garlands  as  in  festi- 
val procession.  Preceding  the  king,  the  gorgeous  Chariot  of  the 
Sun  moved  slowly,  drawn  by  eight  milk-white  steeds.  Herodotus 
affirms  that  for  seven  days  and  seven  nights  the  bridges  groaned 
beneath  the  living  tide  that  Asia  was  pouring  into  Europe.1 

Battle  of  Thermopylae  (480  b.c). — Leading  from  Thessaly 
into  Central  Greece  is  a  narrow  pass,  pressed  on  one  side  by  the 
sea  and  on  the  other  by  rugged  mountain  ridges.  At  the  foot  of 
the  cliffs  break  forth  several  hot  springs,  whence  the  name  of  the 
pass,  Thermopylae,  or  "  Hot  Gates." 

At  this  point,  in  accordance  with  the  decision  of  the  Corinthian 
Congress,  was  offered  the  first  resistance  to  the  progress  of  the 
Persian  army.  Leonidas,  king  of  Sparta,  with  three  hundred 
Spartan  soldiers  and  about  six  thousand  allies  from  different  states 

1  According  to  Herodotus,  the  land  and  naval  forces  of  Xerxes  amounted 
to  2,317,000  men,  besides  about  2,000,000  slaves  and  attendants.  It  is  believed 
that  these  figures  are  a  great  exaggeration,  and  that  the  actual  number  of  the 
Persian  army  could  not  have  exceeded  900,000  men. 


BATTLE  OF  THERMOPYLM.  133 

of  Greece,  held  the  pass.  As  the  Greeks  were  about  to  celebrate 
the  Olympian  games,  which  their  religious  scruples  would  not  allow 
them  to  postpone,  they  left  this  handful  of  men  unsupported  to  hold 
in  check  the  army  of  Xerxes  until  the  festival  days  should  be  past. 

The  Spartans  could  be  driven  from  their  advantageous  position 
only  by  an  attack  in  front,  as  the  Grecian  fleet  prevented  Xerxes 
from  landing  a  force  in  their  rear.  Before  assaulting  them,  Xerxes 
summoned  them  to  give  up  their  arms.  The  answer  of  Leonidas 
was,  "Come  and  take  them."  For  two  days  the  Persians  tried 
to  storm  the  pass.  The  Asiatics  were  driven  to  the  attack  by 
their  officers  armed  with  whips.  But  every  attempt  to  force  the 
way  was  repulsed ;  even  the  Ten  Thousand  Immortals  were  hurled 
back  from  the  Spartan  front  like  waves  from  a  cliff. 

But  an  act  of  treachery  on  the  part  of  a  native  Greek  rendered 
unavailing  all  the  bravery  of  the  keepers  of  the  pass.  A  by-way 
leading  over  the  mountains  to  the  rear  of  the  Spartans  was 
revealed  to  Xerxes.  The  startling  intelligence  was  brought  to 
Leonidas  that  the  Persians  were  descending  the  mountain-path 
in  his  rear.  He  saw  instantly  that  all  was  lost.  The  allies  were 
permitted  to  seek  safety  in  flight  while  opportunity  remained.  But 
to  him  and  his  Spartan  companions  there  could  be  no  thought  of 
retreat.  Death  in  the  pass,  the  defence  of  which  had  been 
intrusted  to  them,  was  all  that  Spartan  honor  and  Spartan  law 
now  left  them.  The  next  day,  surrounded  by  the  Persian  host, 
they  fought  with  desperate  valor;  but,  overwhelmed  by  mere 
numbers,  they  were  slain  to  the  last  man.     With  them  also  per- 

Sished  seven  hundred  Thespians  who  had  chosen  death  with  their 
companions.  Over  the  bodies  of  the  Spartan  soldiers  a  monu- 
ment was  afterwards  erected  with  this  inscription  :  "  Stranger,  tell 
the  Lacedaemonians  that  we  lie  here  in  obedience  to  their  orders." 
The  Burning  of  Athens. — Athens  now  lay  open  to  the  invaders. 
The  Peloponnesians,  thinking  of  their  own  safety  simply,  com- 
menced throwing  up  defences  across  the  isthmus  of  Corinth,  work- 
ing day  and  night  under  the  impulse  of  an  almost  insane  fear. 
Athens  was  thus  left  outside  to  care  for  herself. 


134  THE   GRMCO-PERSIAN   WARS. 

Counsels  were  divided.  The  Delphian  oracle  had  obscurely 
declared, "  When  everything  else  in  the  land  of  Cecrops  shall  be 
taken,  Zeus  grants  to  Athena  that  the  wooden  walls  alone  shall 
remain  unconquered,  to  defend  you  and  your  children."  The 
oracle  was  believed  to  be,  as  was  declared,  "firm  as  adamant." 

But  there  were  various  opinions  as  to  what  was  meant  by  the 
"wooden  walls."  Some  thought  the  Pythian  priestess  directed 
the  Athenians  to  seek  refuge  in  the  forests  on  the  mountains ; 
but  Themistocles  (who  it  is  thought  may  have  himself  prompted 
the  oracle)  contended  that  the  ships  were  plainly  indicated. 

The  last  interpretation  was  acted  upon.  All  the  soldiers  of 
Attica  were  crowded  upon  the  vessels  of  the  fleet  at  Salamis.  The 
aged  men,  with  the  women  and  children,  were  carried  out  of  the 
country  to  different  places  of  safety.  All  the  towns  of  Attica,  with 
the  capital,  were  thus  abandoned  to  the  conquerors. 

A  few  days  afterwards  the  Persians  entered  upon  the  deserted 
plain,  which  they  rendered  more  desolate  by  ravaging  the  fields 
and  burning  the  empty  towns.  Athens  shared  the  common  fate, 
and  her  splendid  temples  sank  in  flames.  Sardis  was  avenged. 
The  joy  in  distant  Susa  was  unbounded. 

The  Naval  Battle  of  Salamis  (480  b.c).  —  Just  off  the  coast 
of  Attica,  separated  from  the  mainland  by  a  narrow  passage  of 
water,  lies  the  island  of  Salamis.  Here  lay  the  Greek  fleet,  await- 
ing the  Persian  attack.  To  hasten  on  the  attack  before  dissensions 
should  divide  the  Greek  forces,  Themistocles  resorted  to  the  fol- 
lowing stratagem.  He  sent  a  messenger  to  Xerxes  representing 
that  he  himself  was  ready  to  espouse  the  Persian  cause,  and 
advised  an  immediate  attack  upon  the  Athenian  fleet,  which  he 
represented  as  being  in  no  condition  to  make  any  formidable 
resistance.  Xerxes  was  deceived.  He  ordered  an  immediate 
attack.  From  a  lofty  throne  upon  the  shore  he  himself  over- 
looked the  scene  and  watched  the  result.  The  Persian  fleet  was 
broken  to  pieces  and  two  hundred  of  the  ships  destroyed.1 

1  The  entire  Persian  fleet  numbered  about  seven  hundred  and  fifty  vessels; 
the  Grecian,  about  three  hundred  and  eighty-five  ships,  mostly  triremes. 


BATTLES   OF  PLATAEA   AND  MYCALE.  135 

The  blow  was  decisive.  Xerxes,  fearing  that  treachery  might 
burn  or  break  the  Hellespontine  bridges,  instantly  despatched  a 
hundred  ships  to  protect  them ;  and  then,  leaving  Mardonius  with 
three  hundred  thousand  men  to  retrieve  the  disaster  of  Salamis, 
and  effect,  as  he  promised  to  do,  the  conquest  of  the  rest  of 
Greece,  the  monarch  set  out  on  his  ignominious  retreat  to  Asia.1 

The  Battles  of  Plataea  and  Mycale  (479  b.c).  —  The  next  year 
the  Persian  fleet  and  army  thus  left  behind  in  Europe  were  entirely 
destroyed,  both  on  the  same  day  —  the  army  at  Plataea,  near 
Thebes,  by  the  combined  Greek  forces  under  the  Spartan  Pausa- 
nias ;  and  the  fleet,  including  the  Asiatic  land  forces,  at  Mycale, 
on  the  Ionian  coast. 

The  battles  of  Salamis,  Plataea,  and  Mycale  were  the  successive 
blows  that  shattered  into  fragments  the  most  splendid  armaments 
ever  commanded  by  Asiatic  despot. 

Memorials  and  Trophies  of  the  War.  —  The  glorious  issue  of 
the  war  caused  a  general  burst  of  joy  and  exultation  throughout 
all  Greece.  Poets,  artists,  and  orators,  all  vied  with  one  another 
in  commemorating  the  deeds  of  the  heroes  whose  valor  had  warded 
off  the  impending  danger. 

Nor  did  the  pious  Grecians  think  that  the  marvellous  deliver- 
ance had  been  effected  without  the  intervention  of  the  gods  in 
their  behalf.  To  the  temple  at  Delphi  was  gratefully  consecrated 
a  tenth  of  the  immense  spoils  in  gold  and  silver  from  the  field  of 
Plataea ;  and  within  the  sanctuary  of  Athena,  upon  the  Acropolis 
at  Athens,  were  placed  the  broken  cables  of  the  Hellespontine 
bridges,  at  once  a  proud  trophy  of  victory,  and  a  signal  illustration 
of  the  divine  punishment  that  had  befallen  the  audacious  and  im- 
pious attempt  to  lay  a  yoke  upon  the  sacred  waters  of  the  Helles- 
pont. 

1  On  the  very  day  of  the  battle  of  Salamis,  Gelon  of  Syracuse  gained  a 
great  victory  over  the  Carthaginians  at  the  battle  of  Himera,  in  the  north  of 
Sicily.  So  it  was  a  memorable  day  for  Hellas  in  the  West  as  well  as  in  the 
East. 


136  PERIOD    OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 


CHAPTER    XIV.       * 
PERIOD  OF  ATHENIAN   SUPREMACY. 

(479-431  B-C-) 

Rebuilding  the  Walls  of  Athens.  —  After  the  Persians  had  been 
expelled  from  Greece,  the  first  care  of  the  Athenians  was  the 
rebuilding  of  their  homes.  Their  next  task  was  the  restoration  of 
the  city  walls.  The  exalted  hopes  for  the  future  which  had  been 
raised  by  the  almost  incredible  achievements  of  the  past  few  months, 
led  the  Athenians  to  draw  a  vast  circuit  of  seven  miles  about  the 
Acropolis  as  the  line  of  the  new  ramparts. 

The  rival  states  of  the  Peloponnesus  watched  the  proceedings 
of  the  Athenians  with  the  most  jealous  interest.  While  they  could 
not  but  admire  Athens,  they  feared  her.  Sparta  sent  an  embassy 
to  dissuade  the  citizens  from  rebuilding  the  walls,  hypocritically 
assigning  as  the  cause  of  her  interest  in  the  matter  her  solicitude 
lest,  in  case  of  another  Persian  invasion,  the  city,  if  captured, 
might  become  a  shelter  and  defence  to  the  enemy.  But  the 
Athenians  persisted  in  their  purpose,  and  in  a  marvellously  short 
time  had  raised  the  wall  to  such  a  height  that  they  could  defy 
interference. 

Themistocles'  Naval  Policy.  —  Themistocles  saw  clearly  that 
the  supremacy  of  Athens  among  the  Grecian  states  must  be  secured 
and  maintained  by  her  mastery  of  the  sea.  He  had  unbounded 
visions  of  the  maritime  power  and  glory  that  might  come  to  her 
through  her  fleet,  those  "  wooden  walls  "  to  which  at  this  moment 
she  owed  her  very  existence ;  and  he  succeeded  in  inspiring  his 
countrymen  with  his  own  enthusiasm  and  sanguine  hopes. 

In  the  prosecution  of  his  views,  Themistocles  persuaded  the 
Athenians  to  enlarge  the  harbor  of  Piraeus,  the  most  spacious  of 


OSTRACISM  OF  THEMISTOCLES.  137 

the  ports  of  Athens,  and  to  surround  the  place  with  immense  walls, 
far  exceeding,  both  in  compass  and  strength,  those  of  the  capital. 
He  also  led  his  countrymen  to  the  resolution  of  adding  each  year 
twenty  well-equipped  triremes  to  their  navy. 

This  policy,  initiated  by  Themistocles,  was,  as  we  shall  see,  zeal- 
ously pursued  by  the  statesmen  that  after  him  successively  assumed 
the  lead  in  Athenian  affairs. 

His  Ostracism.  — Themistocles  well  deserved  the  honor  of  being 
called,  as  he  was,  the  founder  of  the  New  Athens.  But,  although 
an  able  statesman,  he  was  an  unscrupulous  man.  He  accepted 
bribes  and  sold  his  influence,  thereby  acquiring  an  enormous  prop- 
erty. Finally  he  was  ostracized  (471  B.C.).  After  long  wanderings, 
lie  became  a  resident  at  the  court  of  the  Persian  king. 

Tradition  affirms  that  Artaxerxes,  in  accordance  with  Persian 
usage,  provided  for  the  courtier  exile  by  assigning  to  three  cities 
in  Asia  Minor  the  care  of  providing  for  his  table  :  one  furnished 
bread,  a  second  meat,  and  a  third  wines.  It  is  told  that  one  day, 
as  lie  sat  down  to  his  richly  loaded  board,  he  exclaimed,  "  How 
much  we  should  have  lost,  my  children,  if  we  had  not  been  ruined  ! " 

The  Confederacy  of  Delos  (477  b.c).  —  In  order  that  they 
might  be  able  to  carry  on  the  war  more  effectively  against  the  Per- 
sians, the  Ionian  states  of  Asia  Minor,  the  islands  of  the  ^Egean, 
and  some  of  the  states  in  Greece  proper,  shortly  after  the  battle 
of  l'lataea, "formed  themselves  into  what  is  known  as  the  Confed- 
eracy  of  Delos.  Sparta,  on  account  of  her  military  reputation, 
had  hitherto  been  accorded  the  place  of  pre-eminence  and  author- 
ity in  all  such  alliances  of  the  Hellenic  cities.  She  had  come, 
indeed,  to  regard  herself  as  the  natural  guardian  and  leader  of 
ce.  But  at  this  time  the  unbearable  arrogance  of  the  Spartan 
ral  Pausanias,  who  presumed  upon  the  great  reputation  he  had 
gained  at  the  battle  of  Platrea,  led  the  states  which  had  entered 
into  the  alliance  to  look  to  Athens  to  assume  the  position  of  leader- 
ship in  the  new  confederacy. 

The  lofty  character  of  Aristides,  who  was  now  the  most  promi- 
nent Athenian  leader,  and  his  great  reputation  for  fairness  and  in- 


138  PERIOD   OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 

corruptible  integrity,  also  contributed  to  the  same  result.  He  was 
chosen  the  first  president  of  the  league  (477  B.C.),  and  the  sacred 
island  of  Delos  was  made  the  repository  of  the  common  funds. 
What  proportion  of  the  ships  and  money  needed  for  carrying  out 
the  purposes  of  the  union  should  be  contributed  by  the  different 
states,  was  left  entirely  to  the  decision  of  Aristides,  such  was  the 
confidence  all  had  in  his  equity ;  and  so  long  as  he  had  control  of 
the  matter,  none  of  the  members  of  the  alliance  ever  had  cause  of 
complaint. 

Thus  did  Sparta  lose,  and  Athens  gain,  the  place  of  precedence 
among  the  Ionian  states.  The  Dorian  states  of  the  Peloponnesus, 
in  the  main,  still  looked  to  Sparta  as  their  leader  and  adviser.  All 
Greece  was  thus  divided  into  two  great  leagues,  under  the  rival 
leadership  of  Sparta  and  Athens. 

The  Athenians  convert  the  Delian  League  into  an  Empire.  — 
The  Confederacy  of  Delos  laid  the  basis  of  the  imperial  power  of 
Athens.  The  Athenians  misused  their  authority  as  leaders  of  the 
league,  and  gradually,  during  the  interval  between  the  formation 
of  the  union  and  the  beginning  of  the  Peloponnesian  War,  reduced 
their  allies,  or  confederates,  to  the  condition  of  tributaries  and 
subjects. 

Athens  transformed  the  league  into  an  empire  in  the  following 
manner.  The  contributions  assessed  by  Aristides  upon  the  differ- 
ent members  of  the  confederation  consisted  of  ships  and  their 
crews  for  the  larger  states,  and  of  money  payments  for  the  smaller 
ones.  From  the  first,  Athens  attended  to  this  assessment  matter, 
and  saw  to  it  that  each  member  of  the  league  made  its  proper 
contribution.  After  a  while,  some  of  the  cities  preferring  to  make 
a  money  payment  in  lieu  of  ships,  Athens  accepted  the  commuta- 
tion, and  then  building  the  ships  herself,  added  them  to  her  own 
navy.  Thus  the  confederates  disarmed  themselves  and  armed 
their  master. 

Very  soon  the  restraints  which  Athens  imposed  upon  her  allies 
became  irksome,  and  they  began  to  refuse,  one  after  another,  to 
pay  the  assessment  in  any  form.     Naxos,  one  of  the  Cyclades, 


THE  LEADERSHIP  OF  CIMON.  139 

was  the  first  island  to  secede,  as  it  were,  from  the  league  (466 
B.C.).  But  Athens  had  no  idea  of  admitting  any  such  doctrine  of 
state  rights,  and  with  her  powerful  navy  forced  the  Naxians  to 
remain  within  the  union,  and  to  pay  an  increased  tribute. 

What  happened  in  the  case  of  Naxos  happened  in  the  case  of 
almost  all  the  other  members  of  the  confederation.  By  the  year 
449  B.C.  only  three  of  the  island  members  of  the  league  still 
retained  their  independence. 

Even  before  this  date  (probably  about  45  7  B.C.)  the  Athenians 
had  transferred  the  common  treasury  from  Delos  to  Athens,  and 
diverting  the  tribute  from  its  original  purpose,  were  beginning  to 
spend  it,  not  in  the  prosecution  of  war  against  the  Barbarians,  but 
in  the  execution  of  home  enterprises,  as  though  the  treasure  were 
their  own  revenue. 

Thus  what  had  been  simply  a  voluntary  confederation  of  sov- 
ereign and  independent  cities,  was  converted  into  what  was  prac- 
tically an  absolute  monarchy,  with  the  Attic  democracy  as  the 
imperial  master. 

What  made  this  servitude  of  the  former  allies  of  Athens  all  the 
more  galling  was  the  fact  that  they  themselves  had  been  com- 
pelled to  forge  the  very  chains  which  fettered  them ;  for  it  was 
their  money  that  had  built  and  was  maintaining  the  fleet  by  which 
they  were  kept  in  subjection  and  forced  to  do  whatever  might  be 
the  will  of  the  Athenians. 

The  Leadership  of  Cimon ;  his  Ostracism.  —  One  of  the  ablest 
and  most  popular  of  the  generals  who  commanded  the  forces  of 
the  Athenians  during  this  same  period  when  they  were  enslaving 
their  confederates,  was  Cimon,  the  son  of  Miltiades.  He  was  one 
of  those  whose  spirits  had  been  fired  by  the  exciting  events  attend- 
ant upon  the  Persian  invasion.  He  had  acquired  a  certain  repu- 
tation, at  the  time  of  the  abandonment  of  Athens,  by  being  the 
first  to  hang  up  his  bridle  in  the  sanctuary  of  the  Acropolis,  thus 
expressing  his  resolution  to  place  all  his  confidence  in  the  fleet,  as 
Themistocles  advised. 

The  popularity  of  Cimon  at  last  declined,  and  he  suffered  ostra- 


140  PERIOD   OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 

cism,  as  had  Aristides  and  Themistocles  before  him.  His  loss  of 
public  favor  came  about  in  this  manner.  In  the  year  464  B.C.,  a 
terrible  earthquake  destroyed  a  large  portion  of  Sparta.  In  the 
panic  of  the  appalling  disaster  the  Spartans  were  led  to  believe 
that  the  evil  had  befallen  them  as  a  punishment  for  their  recent 
violation  of  the  Temple  of  Poseidon,  from  which  some  Helots  who 
had  fled  to  the  sanctuary  for  refuge  had  been  torn.  The  Helots, 
on  their  part,  were  quick  to  interpret  the  event  as  an  intervention 
of  the  gods  in  their  behalf,  and  as  an  unmistakable  signal  for  their 
uprising.  Everywhere  they  flew  to  arms,  and,  being  joined  by 
some  of  the  Periceci,  furiously  attacked  their  masters.  The  Spar- 
tans, after  maintaining  the  bitter  struggle  for  several  years,  finding 
themselves  unable  to  reduce  their  former  slaves  to  submission, 
were  forced  to  ask  aid  of  the  other  Grecian  states. 

The  great  Athenian  statesman  Pericles  implored  his  countrymen 
not  to  lend  themselves  to  the  building  up  of  the  power  of  their 
rival.  But  the  aristocratic  Cimon,  who  had  always  entertained  the 
most  friendly  feelings  for  the  Spartans,  exhorted  the  Athenians  to 
put  aside  all  sentiments  of  enmity  or  jealousy,  and  to  extend  succor 
to  their  kinsmen.  "Let  not  Greece,"  said  he,  "be  lamed,  and 
thus  Athens  herself  be  deprived  of  her  yokefellow."  The  assem- 
bly Voted  as  he  advised,  and  so  the  Athenian  forces  fought  for 
some  time  side  by  side  with  the  Lacedaemonians. 

But  the  Spartans  were  distrustful  of  their  Athenian  allies,  and 
fearing  they  might  pass  over  to  the  side  of  the  Helots,  they  dis- 
missed them.  The  discourtesy  of  the  act  aroused  the  most  bitter 
resentment  at  Athens.  The  party  of  Pericles  took  advantage  of 
the  exasperated  feelings  of  the  people  to  effect  some  important 
changes  in  the  constitution  in  favor  of  the  people,  which  made  it 
almost  purely  democratical  in  character,  and  to  secure  the  exercise 
of  the  ostracism  against  Cimon  as  the  leader  of  the  aristocratical 
party  and  the  friend  of  Sparta  (459  B.C.). 


GENERAL  FEATURES   OF  THE  AGE. 


141 


The  Age  of  Pericles  (459-431  B.C.). 

General  Features  of  the  Age.  —  Under  the  inspiration  of  Per- 
icles, the  Athenian  state  now  entered  upon  the  most  brilliant 
period  of  its  history.  The  epoch  embraces  less  than  the  lifetime 
of  a  single  generation,  yet  its  influence  upon  the  civilization  of 
the  world  can  hardly  be  overrated.  During  this  short  period 
Athens  gave  birth  to  more  great  men  —  poets,  artists,  statesmen, 
and  philosophers  —  than  all  the  world 
besides  has  produced  in  any  period  of 
equal  length. 

Among  all  the  great  men  of  this  age, 
Pericles  stood  pre-eminent.  Such  was 
the  impression  he  left  upon  the  period  in 
which  he  lived,  that  it  is  called  after 
him  the  Periclean  Age.  Yet  Pericles'  au- 
thority was  simply  that  which  talent  and 
character  justly  confer.  He  ruled,  as 
Plutarch  says,  by  the  art  of  persuasion. 

During  the  Periclean  period  the 
Athenian  democracy  was  supreme. 
Every  matter  that  concerned  the  em- 
pire was  discussed  and  decided  by  the  ^j 
popular  assembly.  Never  before  had  MmSt 
any  people  enjoyed  such  perfect  politi- 
cal liberty  as  did  the  citizens  of  Athens 
at  this  time,  and  never  before  were  any  people,  through  so  inti- 
mate a  knowledge  of  public  affairs,  so  well  able  to  direct  the 
policies  of  state.  Every  citizen,  it  is  affirmed,  was  qualified  to 
hold  civil  office. 

Pericles  fosters  the  Naval  Power  of  Athens.  —  Cimon's  pol- 
icy had  been  to  keep  the  Grecian  cities  united  in  order  that  they 
might  offer  effectual  resistance  to  the  Persian  power.  The  aim  of 
his  rival  Pericles  was  to  maintain  Athens  as  the  leading  state  in 
Hellas,  and  to  oppose  the  pretensions  of  Sparta.     Accordingly  he 


PERICLES. 


142 


PERIOD    OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 


encouraged  the  Athenians  to  strengthen  their  naval  armament  and 
to  perfect  themselves  in  naval  discipline,  for  with  Themistocles  he 
was  convinced  that  the  supremacy  of  Athens  must  depend  chiefly 
upon  her  fleet. 

As  a  part  of  his  maritime  policy,  Pericles  persuaded  the  Athe- 
nians to  build  what  were  known  as  the  Long  Walls,  —  great  ram- 
parts between  four  and  five  miles  in  length,  —  which  united  Athens 
to  the  ports  of  Piraeus  and  Phalerum.     Later,  as  a  double  security, 


sir 

y^VThe  Academy 

^ 

W^m<^ 

m^^lk      7 

i    ^fOr* 

lffm-rCL\                                                        MtHymettus  1 
PhfflKj 

ATHENS  AND   THE    LONG   WALLS. 


a  third  wall  was  built  parallel  to  the  one  running  to  the  former 
harbor.  By  means  of  these  walls  Athens  and  her  ports,  with  the 
intervening  land,  were  converted  into  a  vast  fortified  district, 
capable  in  time  of  war  of  holding  the  entire  population  of  Attica. 
With  her  communication  with  the  sea  thus  secured,  and  with  a 
powerful  navy  at  her  command,  Athens  could  bid  defiance  to  her 
foes  on  sea  and  land. 
Events  leading  up  to  the  Thirty  Years'  Truce.  —  At  the  same 


PUBLIC  BUILDINGS.  143 

time  that  Pericles  was  making  the  maritime  supremacy  of  Athens 
more  secure,  he  was  endeavoring  to  build  up  for  her  a  land  empire 
in  Central  Greece.  As  her  influence  in  this  quarter  increased, 
Sparta  became  more  and  more  jealous,  and  strove  to  counteract  it, 
chiefly  by  enhancing  the  power  of  Thebes. 

The  contest  between  the  two  rivals  was  long  and  bitter.  It  was 
ended  by  the  well-known  Peace  of  Pericles,  or  the  Thirty  Years' 
Truce  (445  B.C.).  By  the  terms  of  this  treaty  each  of  the  rival 
cities  was  left  at  the  head  of  the  confederation  it  had  formed,  but 
neither  was  to  interfere  with  the  subjects  or  allies  of  the  other, 
while  those  cities  of  Hellas  which  were  not  yet  members  of  either 
league  were  to  be  left  free  to  join  either  according  to  choice. 

The  real  meaning  of  the  Truce  was  that  Athens  gave  up  her 
ambition  to  establish  a  land  empire,  and  was  henceforth  to  be  con- 
tent with  supremacy  on  the  seas.  It  meant  further  that  Greece 
was  to  remain  a  house  divided  against  itself;  that  democratic 
Athens  must  share  with  aristocratic  Sparta  the  hegemony,  or  lead- 
ership, of  the  Hellenic  cities. 

Pericles  adorns  Athens  with  Public  Buildings.  —  Notwith- 
standing Pericles  had  failed  to  build  up  for  Athens  a  land  domin- 
ion, he  had  nevertheless  succeeded  in  securing  for  her  a  place  of 
proud  pre-eminence  in  maritime  Hellas.  Athens  having  achieved 
such  a  position  as  she  now  held,  it  was  the  idea  of  Pericles  that 
the  Athenians  should  so  adorn  their  city  that  it  should  be  a  fitting 
symbol  of  the  power  and  glory  of  their  empire.  Nor  was  it  diffi- 
Calt  for  him  to  persuade  his  art-loving  countrymen  to  embellish 
their  city  with  those  masterpieces  of  genius  that  in  their  ruins  still 
excite  the  admiration  of  the  world. 

Upon  the  commanding  site  of  the  Acropolis  was  erected  the  un- 
rivalled Parthenon.  Various  other  edifices,  rich  with  sculptures, 
were  also  erected  there  and  in  different  parts  of  Athens,  until  the 
whole  city  took  on  a  surprisingly  brilliant  and  magnificent  appear- 
ance. The  whole  world  looked  up  to  the  Attic  city  with  the  same 
surprised  wonder  with  which  a  century  before  it  had  regarded  the 


144  PERIOD    OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 

city  of  Babylon  as  adorned  by  the  power  and  wealth  of  the  great 
Nebuchadnezzar. 

The  Athenians  secured  the  vast  sums  of  money  needed  for  the 
prosecution  of  their  great  architectural  works,  out  of  the  treasury 
of  the  Delian  confederacy.  The  allies  naturally  declaimed  bitterly 
against  this  proceeding,  complaining  that  Athens,  with  their  money, 
was  "  gilding  itself  as  a  proud  and  vain  woman  decks  herself  out 
with  jewels."  But  the  answer  of  Pericles  to  them  was,  that  the 
money  was  contributed  to  the  end  that  the  cities  of  the  league 
should  be  protected  from  the  Persians,  and  that  so  long  as  the 
Athenians  kept  the  enemy  at  a  distance  they  had  a  right  to  use 
the  money  as  they  pleased. 

The  Citizens  are  taken  into  the  Pay  of  the  State.  —  It  was  a 
fixed  idea  of  Pericles  that  in  a  democracy  there  should  be  not 
only  an  equal  distribution  of  political  rights  among  all  classes,  but 
also  an  equalization  of  the  means  and  opportunities  of  exercising 
these  rights,  as  well  as  an  equal  participation  by  all  in  social  and 
intellectual  enjoyments. 

In  promoting  his  views  Pericles  carried  to  great  length  the  sys- 
tem of  payment  for  the  most  common  public  services.  Thus,  he 
introduced  the  custom  of  military  pay  ;  hitherto  the  Athenian  sol- 
dier had  served  his  country  in  the  field  as  a  matter  of  honor  and 
duty.  He  also  secured  the  payment  of  the  citizen  for  serving  as 
a  juryman,  as  well  as  for  his  attendance  upon  the  meetings  of  the 
popular  assembly.  Through  his  influence,  also,  salaries  were  at- 
tached to  the  various  civil  offices,  the  most  of  which  had  hitherto 
been  unpaid  positions. 

These  various  measures  enabled  the  poorer  citizens  to  enjoy, 
without  an  inconvenient  sacrifice,  their  franchise  in  the  popular 
assembly,  and  to  offer  themselves  for  the  different  magistracies, 
which  up  to  this  time  had  been  practically  open  only  to  men  of 
means  and  leisure. 

Furthermore,  Pericles  introduced  or  extended  the  practice  of 
supplying  all  the  citizens  with  free  tickets  to  the  theatre  and  other 


ATHENIAN  RESOURCES.  145 

places  of  amusement,  and  of  banqueting  the  people  on  festival 
days  at  the  public  expense. 

Strength  and  Weakness  of  the  Athenian  Empire. — Under 
Pericles  Athens  had  become  the  most  powerful  naval  state  in  the 
world.  In  one  of  his  last  speeches,  made  at  the  outbreak  of  the 
Peloponnesian  War,  in  which  he  recounts  the  resources  of  the 
Athenian  empire,  Pericles  says  to  his  fellow-citizens  :  "  There  is 
not  now  a  king,  there  is  not  any  nation  in  the  universal  world, 
able  to  withstand  that  navy  which  at  this  juncture  you  can  launch 
out  to  sea." 

But  the  most  significant  feature  of  this  new  imperial  power  was 
the  combination  of  these  vast  material  resources  with  the  most 
imposing  display  of  intellectual  resources  that  the  world  had  ever 
witnessed.  Never  before  had  there  been  such  a  union  of  the  ma- 
terial and  intellectual  elements  of  civilization  at  the  seat  of  empire. 
Literature  and  art  had  been  carried  to  the  utmost  perfection  pos- 
sible to  human  genius.  Art  was  represented  by  the  inimitable 
creations  of  Phidias  and  Polygnotus.  The  drama  was  illustrated 
by  the  incomparable  tragedies  of  v^schylus,  Sophocles,  and  Eurip- 
ides, and  by  the  comedies  of  Aristophanes,  while  the  writing  of 
the  world's  annals  had  become  an  art  in  the  graceful  narrations  of 
Herodotus. 

But  there  were  elements  of  weakness  in  the  splendid  imperial 
structure.  The  subject  cities  of  the  empire  were  the  slaves  of 
Athens.  To  her  they  paid  tribute.  To  her  courts  they  were 
dragged  for  trial.  Naturally  they  regarded  Athens  as  the  de- 
stroyer of  Hellenic  liberties,  and  watched  impatiently  for  the  first 
favorable  moment  to  revolt,  and  throw  off  the  hateful  yoke  that 
she  had  imposed  upon  them.  Hence  the  Athenian,  empire  rested 
upon  a  foundation  of  sand. 

Had  Athens,  instead  of  enslaving  her  confederates  of  the  Delian 
league,  only  been  able  to  find  out  some  way  of  retaining  them  as 
allies  in  an  equal  union,  —  a  great  and  perhaps  impossible  task  in 
that  age  of  the  world,  —  as  head  of  the  federated  Greek  race,  she 
ht  have  secured  for  Hellas   the   sovereignty  of  the  Mediter- 


146  PERIOD   OF  ATHENIAN  SUPREMACY. 

ranean,  and  the  history  of  Rome  might  have  ended  with  the  first 
century  of  the  Republic. 

Furthermore,  in  his  system  of  payment  for  the  most  common 
public  services,  and  of  wholesale  public  gratuities,  Pericles  had 
introduced  or  encouraged  practices  that  had  the  same  demora- 
lizing effects  upon  the  Athenians  that  the  free  distribution  of  grain 
at  Rome  had  upon  the  Roman  populace.  These  pernicious  cus- 
toms cast  discredit  upon  labor,  destroyed  frugality,  and  fostered 
idleness,  thus  sapping  the  virtues  and  strength  of  the  Athenian 
democracy. 

Illustrations  of  these  weaknesses,  as  well  as  of  the  strength  of 
the  Athenian  empire,  will  be  afforded  by  the  great  struggle  between 
Athens  and  Sparta  known  as  the  Peloponnesian  War,  the  causes 
and  chief  incidents  of  which  we  shall  next  rehearse. 


■ATTMW*,  NMTMII*  *  M,,  MlfM,|M  „.,,,».,  MMAIO,  N.  T, 


CAUSES   OF   THE    WAR.  147 


CHAPTER    XV. 

THE   PELOPONNESIAN  WAR:  THE  SPARTAN  AND  THE 
THEBAN  SUPREMACY. 

i.   The  Peloponnesian  War  (431-404  B.C.). 

Causes  of  the  War.  —  During  the  closing  years  of  the  life  of 
Pericles,  the  growing  jealousy  between  Athens  and  Sparta  broke 
out  in  the  long  struggle  known  as  the  Peloponnesian  War.  Peri- 
cles had  foreseen  the  coming  storm  :  "  I  descry  war,"  said  he, 
**  lowering  from  the  Peloponnesus."  His  whole  later  policy  looked 
toward  the  preparation  of  Athens  for  the  "irrepressible  conflict." 

The  immediate  causes  of  the  war  were,  first,  the  interference  of 
Athens,  on  the  side  of  the  Corcyraeans,  in  a  quarrel  between  them 
and  their  mother  city  Corinth;  and  secondly,  the  blockade  by  the 
Athenians  of  Potidaea,  on  the  Macedonian  coast.  This  was  a 
(  orinthian  colony,  but  it  was  a  member  of  the  Delian  league,  and 
was  now  being  chastised  by  Athens  for  attempted  secession.  Corr 
inth,  as  the  ever-jealous  naval  rival  of  Athens,  had  endeavored  to 
lend  aid  to  her  daughter,  but  had  been  worsted  in  an  engagement 
with  the  Athenians. 

With  affairs  in  this  shape,  Corinth,  seconded  by  other  states  that 
had  causes  of  complaint  against  Athens,  appealed  to  Sparta,  as  the 
head  of  the  Dorian  alliance,  for  aid  and  justice.  The  Spartans, 
after  listening  to  the  deputies  of  both  sides,  decided  that  the 
Athenians  had  been  guilty  of  injustice,  and  declared  for  war.  The 
resolution  of  the  Spartans  was  endorsed  by  the  Peloponnesian 
confederation,  and  apparently  approved  by  the  Delphian  oracle, 
which,  in  response  to  an  inquiry  of  the  Spartans  as  to  what  would 
be  the  issue  of  the  proposed  undertaking,  assured  them  that  "  they 
would  gain  the  victory,  if  they  fought  with  ail  their  might." 


148  THE   PELOPONNESIAN    WAR. 

Comparison  of  the  Resources  of  Sparta  and  of  Athens.  — The 

resources  of  Hellas  were,  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  very  evenly 
divided  between  the  two  parties.  With  Sparta  were  all  the  states 
of  the  Peloponnesus,  save  Argos  and  Achaia,  while  beyond  the 
Isthmus  the  Boeotian  League,  headed  by  Thebes,  and  other  states 
were  her  allies.  Together,  these  states  could  raise  a  land  force  of 
sixty  thousand  men,  besides  a  considerable  naval  armament,  Cor- 
inth being  especially  strong  in  ships. 

Athens  commanded  all  the  resources  of  the  subject  cities  — 
about  three  hundred  in  number,  with  twice  as  many  smaller  towns 
—  of  her  great  maritime  empire.  Her  independent  allies  were 
Chios,  Lesbos,  Corcyra,  and  other  states.  Of  course  the  chief 
strength  of  Athens  lay  in  her  splendid  navy. 

The  Beginning :  Attack  upon  Plataea  by  the  Thebans.  —  The 
first  act  in  the  long  and  terrible  drama  was  enacted  at  night,  within 
the  walls  of  Plataea.  This  city,  though  in  Boeotia,  was  under  the 
protection  of  Athens,  and  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  Boeo- 
tian League. 

Anxious  to  get  possession  of  this  place  before  the  actual  outbreak 
of  the  war  which  they  saw  to  be  inevitable,  the  Thebans  planned 
its  surprise  and  capture.  Three  hundred  Thebans  gained  access 
to  the  unguarded  city  in  the  dead  of  night,  and  marching  to  the 
public  square,  summoned  the  Plataeans  to  exchange  the  Athenian 
for  a  Boeotian  alliance. 

The  Plataeans  were  upon  the  point  of  acceding  to  all  the  demands 
made  upon  them,  when,  discovering  the  small  number  of  the  enemy, 
they  attacked  and  overpowered  them  in  the  darkness,  and  took  a 
hundred  and  eighty  of  them  prisoners.  These  captives  they  after- 
wards murdered,  in  violation,  as  the  Thebans  always  maintained,  of 
a  sacred  promise  that  their  lives  should  be  spared.  This  wretched 
affair  at  Plataea  precipitated  the  war  (431  B.C.). 

Invasion  of  Attica  :  Pestilence  at  Athens.  —  A  Spartan  army 
was  soon  overrunning  Attica,  while  an  Athenian  fleet  was  ravaging 
the  coasts  of  the  Peloponnesus.  Pericles  persuaded  the  country 
people  of  Attica  to  abandon  their  villas  and  hamlets  and  gather 


CRUEL    CHARACTER    OF  THE    WAR.  149 

within  the  defences  of  the  city.  He  did  not  deem  it  prudent  to  risk 
a  battle  in  the  open  fields.  From  the  walls  of  Athens  the  people 
could  see  the  flames  of  their  burning  villages  and  farmhouses,  as 
the  enemy  ravaged  the  plains  of  Attica  up  to  the  very  gates  of  the 
city.  It  required  all  the  persuasion  of  Pericles  to  restrain  them 
from  issuing  in  a  body  from  behind  the  ramparts  and  rushing  to 
the  defence  of  their  homes. 

The  second  year  the  Lacedaemonians  again  ravaged  the  fields 
about  Athens,  and  drove  the  Athenians  almost  to  frenzy  with  the 
sight  of  the  flame  and  smoke  of  such  property  as  had  escaped  the 
destruction  of  the  previous  year.  To  increase  their  misery,  a  pes- 
tilence broke  out  within  the  crowded  city,  and  added  its  horrors  to 
the  already  unbearable  calamities  of  war.  No  pen  could  picture 
the  despair  and  gloom  that  settled  over  the  city.  Athens  lost, 
probably,  one-fourth  of  her  fighting  men.  Pericles,  who  had  been 
the  very  soul  and  life  of  Athens  through  these  dark  days,  fell  a 
victim  to  the  plague  (429  B.C.).  In  dying,  he  said  he  considered 
his  greatest  praise  to  be  that  "  he  had  never  caused  an  Athenian  to 
put  on  mourning." 

After  the  death  of  Pericles  the  leadership  of  affairs  at  Athens 
fell  into  the  hands  of  unprincipled  demagogues,  of  whom  Cleon 
was  chief.  The  mob  element  got  control  of  the  popular  assembly, 
so  that  hereafter  we  shall  find  many  of  its  actions  characterized 
neither  by  virtue  nor  wisdom. 

Desperate  and  Cruel  Character  of  the  War.  —  On  both  sides 
the  war  was  waged  with  the  utmost  vindictiveness  and  cruelty. 
As  a  rule,  all  the  men  captured  by  either  side  were  killed. 

In  the  year  428  B.C.  the  city  of  Mytilene,  on  the  island  of 
Lesbos,  revolted  from  the  Athenians.  With  the  rebellion  sup- 
pressed, the  fate  of  the  Mytileneans  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
Athenian  assembly.  Cleon  proposed  that  all  the  men  of  the  place, 
thousand  in  number,  should  be  slain,  and  the  women  and 
children  sold  as  slaves.  This  infamous  decree  was  passed,  and 
a  galley  despatched  bearing  the  sentence  for  execution  to  the 
Athenian  general  at  Mytilene. 


150  THE  PELOPONNESIAN   WAR. 

By  the  next  morning,  however,  the  Athenians  had  repented  of 
their  hasty  and  cruel  resolution.  A  second  meeting  of  the  assem- 
bly was  hurriedly  called ;  the  barbarous  vote  was  repealed ;  and  a 
swift  trireme,  bearing  the  reprieve,  set  out  in  anxious  haste  to 
overtake  the  former  galley,  which  had  twenty-four  hours  the  start. 
The  trireme  reached  the  island  just  in  time  to  prevent  the  execu- 
tion of  the  barbarous  edict. 

The  second  resolution  of  the  Athenians,  though  more  discrimi- 
nating than  the  first  decree,  was  quite  severe  enough.  Over  one 
thousand  of  the  nobles  of  Mytilene  were  killed,  the  city  was  de- 
stroyed, and  the  larger  part  of  the  lands  of  the  island  given  to 
citizens  of  Athens. 

Still  more  unrelenting  and  cruel  were  the  Spartans.  In  the 
summer  of  the  same  year  that  the  Athenians  wreaked  such  ven- 
geance upon  the  Mytileneans,  the  Spartans  and  their  allies  cap- 
tured the  city  of  Plataea,  put  to  death  all  the  men,  sold  the  women 
as  slaves,  and  turned  the  site  of  the  city  into  pasture-land. 

Events  leading  up  to  the  Peace  of  Nicias  (421  b.c).  —  Soon 
after  the  affair  at  Mytilene  and  the  destruction  of  Plataea,  an  enter- 
prising general  of  the  Athenians,  named  Demosthenes,  seized  and 
fortified  a  point  of  land  (Pylos)  on  the  coast  of  Messenia.  The 
Spartans  made  every  effort  to  dislodge  the  enemy.  In  the  course 
of  the  siege,  four  hundred  Spartans  under  Brasidas,  having  landed 
upon  a  little  island  (Sphacteria),  were  so  unfortunate  as  to  be  cut 
off  from  the  mainland  by  the  sudden  arrival  of  an  Athenian  fleet. 
About  three  hundred  of  them  were  at  last  captured  and  taken  as 
prisoners  to  Athens. 

But  affairs  now  took  a  different  turn;  the  Athenians  were 
worsted  (at  the  battle  of  Delium,  424  b.c),  and  then  much  in- 
decisive fighting  followed.  At  last  negotiations  for  peace  were 
opened,  which,  after  many  embassies  to  and  fro,  resulted  in  what 
is  known  as  the  Peace  of  Nicias,  from  the  prominent  Athenian 
general  who  is  supposed  to  have  had  most  to  do  in  bringing  it 
about.  The  treaty  arranged  for  a  truce  of  fifty  years.  Each  party 
was  to  give  up  to  the  other  all  prisoners  and  captured  places. 


THE   SICILIAN  EXPEDITION. 


151 


Alcibiades  and  the  Sicilian  Expedition  (415-413  b.c).  —  The 
Peace  of  Nicias  was  only  a  nominal  one.  Some  of  the  allies  of 
the  two  prinqipal  parties  to  the  truce  were  dissatisfied  with  it,  and 
consequently  its  terms  were  not  carried  out  in  good  faith  or  tem- 
per on  either  side.  So  the  war  went  on.  For  about  seven  years, 
however,  Athens  and  Sparta  refrained  from  invading  each  other's 
territory ;  but  even  during  this  period  each  was  aiding  its  allies  in 
making  war  upon  the  dependents  or  confederates  of  the  other. 
Finally,  hostilities  flamed  out  in 
open  and  avowed  war,  and  all  Hel- 
las was  again  lit  up  with  the  fires  of 
the  fratricidal  strife. 

The  most  prominent  person  on 
the  Athenian  side  during  this  latter 
period  of  the  struggle  was  Alcibiades, 
a  versatile  and  brilliant  man,  but  a 
reckless  and  unsafe  counsellor.  He 
was  a  pupil  of  Socrates,  but  he  failed 
to  follow  the  counsels  of  his  teacher. 
His  astonishing  escapades  only 
seemed  to  attach  the  people  more 
closely  to  him,  for  he  possessed  all 
those  personal   traits   which  make 

men  popular  idols.  His  influence  over  the  democracy  was  un- 
limited. He  was  able  to  carry  through  the  popular  assembly  almost 
any  measure  that  it  pleased  him  to  advocate.  The  more  prudent  of 
the  Athenians  were  filled  with  apprehension  for  the  future  of  the 
state  under  such  guidance.  The  noted  misanthrope  Timon  gave 
expression  to  this  feeling  when,  after  Alcibiades  had  secured  the 
assent  of  the  popular  assembly  to  one  of  his  impolitic  measures, 
he  said  to  him :  "  Go  on,  my  brave  boy,  and  prosper ;  for  your 
prosperity  will  bring  on  the  ruin  of  all  this  crowd."  And  it  did, 
as  we  shall  see. 

The  most  prosperous  enterprise  of  Alcibiades,  in  the  Timonian 
sense,  was  the  inciting  the  Athenians  to  undertake  an  expedition 


ALCIBIADES. 


152  THE  PELOPONNESIAN   WAR. 

against  the  Dorian  city  of  Syracuse,  in  Sicily.  The  scheme  that 
Alcibiades  was  revolving  in  his  mind  was  a  most  magnificent  one. 
He  proposed  that  the  Athenians,  after  effecting  the  conquest  of 
Sicily,  should  make  that  island  the  base  of  operations  against  both 
Africa  and  Italy.  With  the  Italians  and  Carthaginians  subdued, 
the  armaments  of  the  entire  Hellenic  world  outside  of  the  Pelopon- 
nesus, were  to  be  turned  against  the  Spartans,  who  with  one  blow 
should  be  forever  crushed,  and  Athens  be  left  the  arbiter  of  the 
destinies  of  Hellas. 

Alcibiades  succeeded  in  persuading  the  Athenians  to  undertake 
at  least  the  first  part  of  the  colossal  enterprise.  An  immense  fleet 
was  carefully  equipped  and  manned.1  Anxiously  did  those  remain- 
ing behind  watch  the  squadron  as  it  bore  away  from  the  port  of 
Athens.  Could  the  watchers  have  foreseen  the  fate  of  the  splen- 
did armament,  their  anxiety  would  have  passed  into  despair. 
"  Athens  itself  was  sailing  out  of  the  Piraeus,  never  again  to 
return." 

Scarcely  had  the  expedition  arrived  at  Sicily,  before  Alcibiades, 
who  was  one  of  the  leading  generals  in  command  of  the  armament, 
was  summoned  back  to  Athens  to  answer  a  charge  of  impiety.2 
Fearing  to  trust  himself  in  the  hands  of  his  enemies  at  Athens,  he 
fled  to  Sparta,  and  there,  by  traitorous  counsel,  did  all  in  his  power 
to  ruin  the  very  expedition  he  had  planned.  He  advised  the 
Spartans  to  send  at  once  their  best  general  to  the  Syracusans. 
They  sent  Gylippus,  an  able  commander,  whose  generalship  con- 
tributed largely  to  the  total  and  irretrievable  defeat  that  the 
Athenians  finally  suffered.  Their  fleet  and  army  were  both  virtu- 
ally annihilated.     Seven  thousand  prisoners  were  crowded  into  the 

1  It  consisted  of  one  hundred  and  thirty-four  costly  triremes,  bearing  thirty- 
six  thousand  soldiers  and  sailors.  The  commanders  were  Alcibiades,  Nicias, 
and  Lamachus.  Later,  Demosthenes  was  sent  out  with  a  reinforcement  con- 
sisting of  seventy-three  triremes  and  five  thousand  soldiers. 

2  Just  upon  the  eve  of  the  departure  of  the  expedition,  the  numerous  stat- 
ues of  Hermes  scattered  throughout  the  city  were  grossly  mutilated.  Alcibi- 
ades was  accused  of  having  had  a  hand  in  the  affair,  and  furthermore  of  having 
mimicked  the  sacred  rites  of  the  Eleusinian  mysteries, 


THE  DECELEAN   WAR.  153 

open  stone  quarries,  where  hundreds  speedily  died  of  exposure  and 
starvation.  Most  of  the  wretched  survivors  were  sold  as  slaves. 
The  disaster  was  appalling  and  complete.  The  resources  of  Athens 
were  wrecked. 

The  Decelean  War:  The  Fall  of  Athens. —While  the  Athe- 
nians were  before  Syracuse,  the  Spartans,  acting  upon  the  advice 
of  Alcibiades,  had  taken  possession  of  and  fortified  a  strong  and 
commanding  position  known  as  Decelea,  in  Attica,  only  twelve 
miles  from  Athens.  This  was  a  thorn  in  the  side  of  Athens. 
Secure  in  this  stronghold,  the  Spartans  could  annoy  and  keep  in 
terror  almost  all  the  Attic  plain.  The  occupation  by  the  Spartans 
of  this  strategic  point  had  such  a  determining  influence  upon  the 
remainder  of  the  Peloponnesian  War,  that  this  latter  portion  of 
it  is  known  as  the  Decelean  War  (413-404  B.C.). 

Taking  advantage  of  the  terrible  misfortunes  of  Athens,  her 
subject-allies  now  revolted  and  fell  away  from  her  on  every  side. 
The  Persians,  ever  ready  to  aid  the  Greeks  in  destroying  one 
another,  lent  a  willing  ear  to  the  solicitations  of  the  traitor  Alci- 
biades, and  gave  help  to  the  Spartans. 

The  Athenians  put  forth  almost  superhuman  efforts  to  retrieve 
their  fortunes.  Had  they  been  united  among  themselves,  perhaps 
their  efforts  might  not  have  been  in  vain.  But  the  oligarchical 
party,  for  the  sake  of  ruining  the  democracy  were  willing  to  ruin 
the  empire.  While  the  army  was  absent  from  Athens,  they  over- 
turned the  government,  and  established  a  sort  of  aristocratical  rule 
(411  B.C.),  under  which  affairs  were  in  the  hands  of  a  council  of 
Four  Hundred. 

The  Athenian  troops,  however,  who  were  at  Samos,  would  not 
recognize  the  new  government.  They  voted  themselves  to  be  the 
true  Athens,  and  forgetting  and  forgiving  the  past,  recalled  Alcibi- 
ades, and  gave  him  command  of  the  army,  thereby  well  illustrating 
what  the  poet  Aristophanes  said  respecting  the  disposition  of  the 
Athenians  towards  the  spoiled  favorite,  —  "  They  love,  they  hate, 
but  cannot  live  without  him." 

Alcibiades.  detached  the  Persians  from  the  side  of  the  Spartans, 


154  THE  PELOPONNESIAN   WAR. 

and  gained  some  splendid  victories  for  Athens.  But  he  could  not 
undo  the  evil  he  had  done.  He  had  ruined  Athens  beyond  re- 
demption by  any  human  power.  Constantly  the  struggle  grew 
more  and  more  hopeless.  Alcibiades  was  defeated,  and  fearing 
to  face  the  Athenians,  who  had  deposed  him  from  his  command, 
sought  safety  in  flight. 

Finally,  at  ^Egospotami,  on  the  Hellespont,  the  Athenian  fleet 
was  surprised  and  captured  by  the  Spartans  under  Lysander  (405 
b.c).  The  prisoners,  three  thousand  in  number,  were  massacred, 
and  the  usual  rites  of  burial  denied  their  bodies. 

The  battle  of  ^Egospotami  sealed  the  fate  of  Athens.  "  That 
night,"  writes  the  historian  Xenophon,  referring  to  the  night  upon 
which  the  news  of  the  woful  disaster  reached  Athens,  "  That  night 
no  man  slept." 

The  towns  on  the  Thracian  and  Macedonian  coasts,  and  the 
islands  of  the  ^gean  belonging  to  the  Athenian  Empire,  now  fell 
into  the  hands  of  the  Peloponnesians.  Athens  was  besieged  by 
sea  and  land,  and  soon  forced  to  surrender.  Some  of  the  allies 
insisted  upon  the  total  destruction  of  the  city,  and  the  conversion 
of  its  site  into  pasture-land.  The  Spartans,  however,  with  appar- 
ent magnanimity,  declared  that  they  would  never  consent  thus  "  to 
put  out  one  of  the  eyes  of  Greece." 

The  real  motive,  doubtless,  of  the  Spartans  in  sparing  the  city 
was  their  fear  lest,  with  Athens  blotted  out,  Thebes  or  Corinth 
should  become  too  powerful.  So  the  city  itself  was  spared,  but 
the  fortifications  of  Piraeus  and  the  Long  Walls  were  levelled  to  the 
ground,  the  work  of  demolition  being  begun  to  the  accompani- 
ment of  festive  music  (404  b.c.)  . 

Sparta's  power  was  now  supreme.  She  had  neither  peer  nor 
rival  among  all  the  Grecian  states.  Throughout  the  war  she  had 
maintained  that  her  only  purpose  in  warring  against  Athens  was 
to  regain  liberty  for  the  Grecian  cities.  We  shall  very  soon  see 
what  sort  of  liberty  it  was  that  they  enjoyed  under  her  guardian- 
ship. 

Results  of  the  War.  —  "  Never,"  says  Thucydides,  commenting 


SPARTAN  SUPREMACY.  155 

upon  the  lamentable  results  of  the  Peloponnesian  War,  "  Never 
had  so  many  cities  been  made  desolate  by  victories ;  .  .  .  never 
were  there  so  many  instances  of  banishment ;  never  so  many 
scenes  of  slaughter  either  in  battle  or  sedition." 

Athens  was  but  the  wreck  of  her  former  self.  She  had  lost  two 
hundred  ships  and  sixty  thousand  men,  including  the  killed  among 
her  allies.  Things  were  just  the  reverse  now  of  what  they  were  at 
the  time  of  the  Persian  invasion.  When,  with  all  Athens  in  ruins, 
Themistocles  at  Salamis  was  taunted  by  the  Spartans  with  being 
a  man  without  a  city,  he  replied  grandly,  "  Athens  is  here  in  her 
ships."  But  now  the  real  Athens  was  gone  ;  only  the  empty  shell 
remained. 

And  all  the  rest  of  Hellas  showed  the  marks  of  the  cruel  war. 
Spots  where  once  had  stood  large  towns  were  now  pasture-land. 
But  more  lamentable  than  all  else  besides,  was  the  effect  of  the 
war  upon  the  intellectual  and  moral  life  of  the  Greek  race.  The 
Grecian  world  had  sunk  many  degrees  in  morality  ;  while  the  vigor 
and  productiveness  of  the  intellectual  and  artistic  life  of  Hellas, 
the  centre  and  home  of  which  had  been  Athens,  were  impaired 
beyond  recovery.  The  achievements  of  the  Greek  intellect,  espe- 
cially in  the  fields  of  philosophic  thought,  in  the  century  following 
the  war  were,  it  is  true,  wonderful ;  but  these  triumphs  merely 
show,  we  may  believe,  what  the  Hellenic  mind  would  have  done 
for  art  and  general  culture,  had  it  been  permitted,  unchecked,  and 
under  the  favoring  and  inspiring  conditions  of  liberty  and  self- 
government,  to  disclose  all  that  was  latent  in  it. 

2.   The  Spartan  and  the  Theban  Supremacy. 

Spartan  Supremacy.  —  For  just  one  generation  following  the 
Peloponnesian  War  (404-371  B.C.),  Sparta  held  the  leadership  of 
the  Grecian  states.  Aristocratical  governments,  with  institutions 
similar  to  the  Spartan,  were  established  in  the  different  cities  of 
the  old  Athenian  Empire.  At  Athens,  the  democratical  constitu- 
tion of  Solon,  under  which  the  Athenians  had  attained  their  great- 
ness, was  abolished,  and  an  oppressive  oligarchy  established    in 


156  SPARTAN  AND    THE  BAN  SUPREMACY. 

its  stead.  The  Thirty  Tyrants,  however,  who  administered  this 
government,  were,  after  eight  months'  infamous  rule,  driven  from 
the  city,  and  the  old  democratic  constitution,  somewhat  modified, 
was  re-established  (403  B.C.) . 

It  was  during  this  period  that  Socrates,  the  greatest  moralist 
and  teacher  of  antiquity  that  Europe  had  produced,  was  con- 
demned to  death,  because  his  teachings  were  thought  contrary 
to  the  religion  of  the  Athenians.  To  this  era  also  belongs  the 
well-known  expedition  of  the  Ten  Thousand  Greeks. 

Expedition  of  the  Ten  Thousand  (401-400  b.c).  —  Cyrus, 
satrap  of  the  Persian  province  of  Asia  Minor,  thinking  that  his 
brother  Artaxerxes  held  the  throne  unjustly,  planned  to  wrest  it 
from  him.  For  carrying  out  this  purpose,  he  raised  an  army  com- 
posed of  a  hundred  thousand  Barbarians  and  about  eleven  thousand 
Greek  mercenaries. 

With  this  force  Cyrus  set  out  from  Sardis,  in  the  spring  of  401 
B.C.  He  marched  without  opposition  across  Asia  Minor  and 
Mesopotamia  to  Babylonia,  into  the  very  heart  of  the  Persian 
empire.  Here,  at  Cunaxa,  he  was  confronted  by  Artaxerxes  with 
a  force  of  more  than  half  a  million  of  men.  The  Barbarian  allies 
of  Cyrus  were  scattered  at  the  first  onset  of  the  enemy ;  but  the 
Greeks  stood  like  a  rampart  of  rock.  Cyrus,  however,  was  slain ; 
and  the  other  Greek  generals,  having  been  persuaded  to  enter  into 
a  council,  were  treacherously  murdered  by  the  Persians. 

The  Greeks,  in  a  hurried  night  meeting,  chose  new  generals  to 
lead  them  back  to  their  homes.  One  of  these  was  Xenophon,  the 
popular  historian  of  the  expedition.  Now  commenced  one  of  the 
most  memorable  retreats  in  all  history.  After  a  most  harassing 
march  over  the  hot  plains  of  the  Tigris  and  the  icy  passes  of 
Armenia,  the  survivors  reached  the  Black  Sea,  the  abode  of  sister 
Greek  colonies. 

Theban  Supremacy  (371-362  b.c).  —  Throughout  all  the  period 
of  her  supremacy,  Sparta  dealt  selfishly  and  tyrannically  with  the 
other  Grecian  states.  But  at  last  the  fiery  resentment  kindled  by 
her  oppressive  measures  inspired  such  a  determined  revolt  against 


THEBAN  SUPREMACY.  157 

her  as  brought  to  an  end  her  assumed  supremacy  over  her  sister 
cities.  It  was  a  city  in  Bceotia  that  led  the  uprising  against  Sparta. 
This  was  Thebes.  The  oligarchical  government  which  the  Lace- 
demonians had  set  up  in  that  capital  was  overthrown  by  Pelopidas 
at  the  head  of  the  so-called  Sacred  Band,  a  company  of  three 
hundred  select  men  who  were  bound  by  oath  to  stand  by  each 
other  to  the  last.  Pelopidas  was  seconded  in  all  his  efforts  by 
Epaminondas,  one  of  the  ablest  generals  the  Grecian  race  ever 
produced.  Under  the  masterly  guidance  and  inspiration  of  these 
patriot  leaders,  Thebes  very  soon  secured  a  predominating  influence 
in  the  affairs  of  Greece. 

It  was  Epaminondas  who,  when  his  enemies  sought  to  disgrace 
and  annoy  him  by  electing  him  "public  scavenger,"  made,  in 
accepting  the  office,  the  memorable  utterance,  "  If  the  office  will 
not  reflect  honor  upon  me,  I  will  reflect  honor  upon  it." 

At  Leuctra  (371  B.C.)  the  Thebans  earned  the  renown  of  being 
the  most  invincible  soldiers  in  the  world  by  completely  overthrow- 
ing, with  a  force  of  six  thousand  men,  the  Spartan  army  of  twice 
that  number.  This  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  time  that  the 
Spartans  were  ever  fairly  defeated  in  open  battle.  Their  forces  had 
been  annihilated,  as  at  Thermopylae, — but  annihilation  is  not 
defeat. 

From  the  victory  of  Leuctra  dates  the  short  but  brilliant  period 
of  Theban  supremacy.  The  year  after  that  battle  Epaminondas 
led  an  army  into  the  Peloponnesus  to  aid  the  Arcadians,  who  had 
risen  against  Sparta.  Laconia  was  ravaged,  and  for  the  first  time 
Spartan  women  saw  the  smoke  of  fires  kindled  by  an  enemy. 

To  strengthen  Arcadia's  power  of  resistance  to  Sparta,  Epami- 
nondas perfected  a  league  among  the  hitherto  isolated  towns 
and  cantons  of  the  district.  As  the  mutual  jealousies  of  the  lead- 
ing cities  prevented  him  from  making  any  one  of  them  the  capital 
of  the  confederation,  he  founded  Megalopolis,  or  the  Great  City, 
and  made  it  the  head  of  the  union.  In  the  pursuit  of  the  same 
policy,  Epaminondas  also  restored  the  independence  of  Messenia. 

But,  moved  by  jealousy  of  the  rapidly  growing  power  of  Thebes, 


158  SPARTAN  AND  THEBAN  SUPREMACY. 

Athens  now  formed  an  alliance  with  her  old  rival  Sparta  against 
her.  Three  times  more  did  Epaminondas  lead  an  army  into  the 
Peloponnesus.  During  his  third  and  last  expedition  he  fought 
with  the  Spartans  and  Athenians  the  great  battle  of  Mantinea,  in 
Arcadia.  On  this  memorable  field,  Epaminondas  led  the  Thebans 
once  more  to  victory ;  but  he  himself  was  slai»,  and  with  him  fell 
the  hopes  and  power  of  Thebes  (362  B.C.). 

All  the  states  of  Greece  now  lay  exhausted,  worn  out  by  their 
endless  domestic  contentions  and  wars.  There  was  scarcely  suffi- 
cient strength  left  to  strike  one  worthy  blow  against  enslavement 
by  the  master  destined  soon  to  come  from  the  North. 


GENERAL  STATEMENT.  159 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

PERIOD   OF   MACEDONIAN   SUPREMACY:    EMPIRE  OF 
ALEXANDER. 

(338-323  B.C.) 

General  Statement.  —  Macedonia  lay  to  the  north  of  Greece 
proper.  The  ruling  class  of  the  country  was  probably  of  Hel- 
lenic race  ;  at  all  events  the  Macedonian  kings  were  allowed  to  take 
part  in  the  Olympian  games  —  a  privilege  accorded  to  none  but 
pure  Hellenes.  Their  efforts  to  spread  Greek  art  and  culture 
among  their  subjects,  a  race  of  rough  but  brave  and  martial  men, 
unaccustomed  to  city  life,  had  been  so  far  successful  that  the 
country  had,  to  a  certain  degree,  become  Hellenized. 

So  this  period  of  Macedonian  supremacy  upon  which  we  are 
entering  belongs  to  the  history  of  the  political  life  of  the  Greek 
race,  as  well  as  the  eras  marked  by  Athenian,  Spartan,  or  Theban 
leadership.  It  was  Hellenic  institutions,  customs,  and  manners, 
Hellenic  language  and  civilization,  that  the  Macedonians,  in  the 
extended  conquests  which  we  are  about  to  narrate,  spread  over 
the  world.1  It  is  this  which  makes  the  short-lived  Macedonian 
empire  so  important  in  universal  history. 

Philip  of  Macedon.  —  Macedonia  first  rose  to  importance  dur- 
ing the  reign  of  Philip  II.  (359-336  B.C.),  better  known  as  Philip 
of  Macedon.     He  was  a  man  of  pre-eminent  ability,  of  wonderful 

1  Of  course  it  was  rather  the  outer  forms  than  the  real  inner  life  and  spirit 
of  the  old  Greek  civilization  which  were  adopted  by  the  non-Hellenic  peoples 
of  Egypt  and  Western  Asia.  Hence  the  resulting  culture  is  given  a  special 
name,  Hellenism,  which,  in  Professor  Jebbs'  language,  means,  —  "  not  '  being 
Hellenes,' or  Greeks,  but  —  'doing  like  Hellenes';  and  as  the  adjective  an- 
swering to  Hellas  is  Hellenic,  so  the  adjective  answering  to  Hellenism  is 
Hellenisticr 


160  PERIOD   OF  MACEDONIAN  SUPREMACY. 

address  in  diplomacy,  and  possessed  rare  genius  as  an  organizer 
and  military  chieftain.  The  art  of  war  he  had  learned  in  youth  as 
a  hostage-pupil  of  Epaminondas  of  Thebes.  He  was  the  origi- 
nator of  the  "  Macedonian  phalanx,"  a  body  as  renowned  in  the 
military  history  of  Macedonia  as  is  the  "  legion  "  in  that  of  Rome. 

With  his  kingdom  settled  and  consolidated  at  home,  Philip's 
ambition  led  him  to  seek  the  leadership  of  the  Grecian  states. 
He  sought  to  gain  his  purpose  rather  by  artful  diplomacy  and  in- 
trigue than  by  open  force.  In  the  use  of  these  weapons  he  might 
have  been  the  teacher  of  the  Athenian  Themistocles. 

The  Second  Sacred  War  (355-346  b.c).  —  Philip  quickly  ex- 
tended his  power  over  a  large  part  of  Thrace  and  the  Greek  cities 
of  Chalcidice.  Meanwhile  he  was,  in  the  following  way,  acquiring 
a  commanding  position  in  the  affairs  of  the  states  of  Greece  proper. 

The  Phocians  had  put  to  secular  use  some  of  the  lands  which, 
at  the  end  of  the  First  Sacred  War  (see  p.  108),  had  been  conse- 
crated to  the  Delphian  Apollo.  Taken  to  task  and  heavily  fined 
for  this  act  by  the  other  members  of  the  Delphian  Amphictyony, 
the  Phocians  deliberately  robbed  the  temple,  and  used  the  treas- 
ure in  the  maintenance  of  a  large  force  of  mercenary  soldiers.  The 
Amphictyons  not  being  able  to  punish  the  Phocians  for  their  im- 
piety, were  forced  to  ask  help  of  Philip,  who  gladly  rendered  the 
assistance  sought. 

The  Phocians  were  now  quickly  subdued,  their  cities  were  de- 
stroyed, and  the  inhabitants  scattered  in  villages  and  forced  to 
pay  tribute  to  the  Delphian  Apollo.  The  place  that  the  Phocians 
had  held  in  the  Delphian  Amphictyony  was  given  to  Philip,  upon 
whom  was  also  bestowed  the  privilege  of  presiding  at  the  Pythian 
games.  The  position  he  had  now  secured  was  just  what  Philip 
had  coveted,  in  order  that  he  might  use  it  to  make  himself  master 
of  all  Greece. 

Battle  of  Chaeronea  (338  b.c).  —  Demosthenes  at  Athens  was 
one  of  the  few  who  seemed  to  understand  the  real  designs  of 
Philip.  His  penetration,  like  that  of  Pericles,  descried  a  cloud 
lowering  over  Greece  —  this  time  from  the  North.     With  all  the 


PLAN  TO  INVADE  ASIA.  161 

energy  of  his  wonderful  eloquence,  he  strove  to  stir  up  the  Athe- 
nians to  resist  the  encroachments  of  the  king  of  Macedon.  He 
hurled  against  him  his  famous  "  Philippics,"  speeches  so  filled  with 
fierce  denunciation  that  they  have  given  name  to  all  writings 
characterized  by  bitter  criticism  or  violent  invective. 

At  length  the  Athenians  and  Thebans,  aroused  by  the  oratory 
of  Demosthenes  and  by  some  fresh  encroachments  of  the  Mace- 
donians, united  their  forces,  and  met  Philip  upon  the  memorable 
field  of  Chaeronea  in  Bceotia.  The  Macedonian  phalanx  swept 
everything  before  it.  The  Theban  band  was  annihilated.  The 
power  and  authority  of  Philip  were  now  extended  and  acknowl- 
edged throughout  Greece  (338  B.C.). 

Plan  to  invade  Asia.  —  While  the  Greek  states  were  divided 
among  themselves,  they  were  united  in  an  undying  hatred  of  the 
Persians.  They  were  at  this  time  meditating  an  enterprise  fraught 
with  the  greatest  importance  to  the  history  of  the  world.  This 
was  a  joint  expedition  against  Persia.  The  march  of  the  Ten 
Thousand  Greeks  through  the  very  heart  of  the  dominions  of  the 
Great  King  had  encouraged  this  national  undertaking,  and  illus- 
trated the  feasibility  of  the  conquest  of  Asia.  At  a  great  council 
of  the  Grecian  cities  held  at  Corinth,  Philip  was  chosen  leader  of 
this  expedition.  All  Greece  was  astir  with  preparation.  In  the 
midst  of  all,  Philip  was  assassinated  during  the  festivities  attending 
the  marriage  of  his  daughter,  and  his  son  Alexander  succeeded  to 
his  place  and  power  (336  B.C.). 

Accession  of  Alexander  the  Great.  —  Alexander  was  only  twenty 
years  of  age  when  he  came  to  his  father's  throne.  The  spirit  of 
the  man  is  shown  in  the  complaint  of  the  boy  when  news  of  his 
father's  victories  came  to  him  :  "  Friends,"  said  he  to  his  play- 
mates, "  my  father  will  possess  himself  of  everything  and  leave 
lothing  for  us  to  do." 

For  about  two  years   Alexander  was   busy  suppressing   revolts 

linst  his  power  among  the  different  cities  of  Hellas,  and  chastis- 
ig  hostile  tribes  on  the  northern  frontiers  of  Macedonia.     Thebes 

iving  risen  against  him,  he  razed  the  city  to  the  ground,  —  spar- 


162 


PERIOD    OF  MACEDONIAN  SUPREMACY. 


ing,  however,  the  house  of  the  poet  Pindar,  —  and  sold  thirty  thou- 
sand of  the  inhabitants  into  slavery.  Thus  was  one  of  the  most 
renowned  of  the  cities  of  Greece  blotted  out  of  existence. 

Alexander  crosses  the  Hellespont  (334  b.c).  —  Alexander  was 
now  free  to  carry  out  his  father's  scheme  in  regard  to  the  Asiatic 
expedition.  In  the  spring  of  334  B.C.,  he  set  out,  at  the  head  of 
an  army  numbering  about  thirty-five  thousand  men,  for  the  con- 


THE   BATTLE  OF   ISSUS.     (From  a  Fresco  found  at  Pompeii.) 

quest  of  the  Persian  empire.  Now  commenced  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  and  swiftly  executed  campaigns  recorded  in  history. 

Crossing  the  Hellespont,  Alexander  routed  the  Persians  at  the 
important  battle  of  the  Granicus,  by  which  victory  all  Asia  Minor 
was  laid  open  to  the  invader. 

The  Battle  of  Issus  (333  b.c).  —  At  the  northeast  corner  of 
the  Mediterranean  lies  the  plain  of  Issus.  Here  Alexander  again 
defeated  the  Persian  army,  numbering  six  hundred  thousand  men. 


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SIEGE  OF  TYRE.  163 

The  family  of  Darius,  including  his  mother,  wife,  and  children,  fell 
into  the  hands  of  Alexander ;  but  the  king  himself  escaped  from 
the  field,  and  hastened  to  his  capital,  Susa,  to  raise  another  army 
to  oppose  the  march  of  the  conqueror. 

Siege  of  Tyre  (332  b.c).  —  Before  penetrating  to  the  heart  of 
the  empire,  Alexander  turned  to  the  south,  in  order  to  effect  the 
subjugation  of  Phoenicia,  that  he  might  command  the  Phoenician 
fleets  and  prevent  their  being  used  to  sever  his  communication 
with  Greece.  The  island-city  of  Tyre,  after  a  memorable  siege, 
was  taken  by  means  of  a  mole,  or  causeway,  built  with  incredible 
labor  through  the  sea  to  the  city.  Eight  thousand  of  the  inhabi- 
tants were  slain,  and  thirty  thousand  sold  into  slavery  —  a  terrible 
warning  to  those  cities  that  should  dare  to  close  their  gates  against 
the  Macedonian. 

Alexander  in  Egypt.  —  With  the  cities  of  Phoenicia  and  the 
fleets  of  the  Mediterranean  subject  to  his  control,  Alexander  easily 
effected  the  conquest  of  Egypt.  The  Egyptians,  indeed,  made  no 
resistance  to  the  Macedonians,  but  willingly  exchanged  masters. 

While  in  the  country,  Alexander  founded,  at  one  of  the  mouths 
of  the  Nile,  a  city  called,  after  himself,  Alexandria.  The  city 
became  the  meeting-place  of  the  East  and  West ;  and  its  import- 
ance through  many  centuries  attests  the  far-sighted  wisdom  of  its 
founder. 

A  less  worthy  enterprise  of  the  conqueror  was  his  expedition  to 
the  oasis  of  Siwah,  located  in  the  Libyan  desert,  where  were  a  cel- 
ebrated temple  and  oracle  of  Zeus  Ammon.  To  gratify  his  own 
vanity,  as  well  as  to  impress  the  superstitious  barbarians,  Alexander 
desired  to  be  declared  of  celestial  descent.  The  priests  of  the 
temple,  in  accordance  with  the  wish  of  the  king,  gave  out  that  the 
oracle  pronounced  Alexander  to  be  the  son  of  Zeus  Ammon,  and 
the  destined  ruler  of  the  world. 

The  Battle  of  Arbela  (331  b.c.).  — From  Egypt  Alexander 
recommenced  his  march  towards  the  Persian  capital.  He  had 
received  offers  of  peace  from  Darius,  but  to  these  he  is  said  to 
have  replied,  "  There  cannot  be  two  suns  in  the  heavens."     Push- 


164  PERIOD   OF  MACEDONIAN  SUPREMACY. 

ing  on,  he  crossed  the  Euphrates  and  the  Tigris  without  opposi- 
tion ;  but  upon  the  plain  of  Arbela,  not  far  from  ancient  Nineveh, 
he  found  his  further  advance  disputed  by  Darius  with  an  immense 
army.  Again  the  Macedonian  phalanx  "  cut  through  the  ranks  of 
the  Persians  as  a  boat  cuts  through  the  waves."  The  fate  of 
Darius  has  been  already  narrated  in  our  story  of  the  last  of  the 
Persian  kings  (see  p.  82). 

The  battle  of  Arbela  was  one  of  the  decisive  combats  of  history. 
It  marked  the  end  of  the  long  struggle  between  the  East  and  the 
West,  between  Persia  and  Greece,  and  prepared  the  way  for  the 
spread  of  Hellenic  civilization  over  all  Western  Asia. 

Alexander  at  Babylon,  Susa,  and  Persepolis.  —  From  the  field 
of  Arbela  Alexander  marched  south  to  Babylon,  which  opened  its 
gates  to  him  without  opposition.  Susa  was  next  entered  by  the 
conqueror.  Here  he  seized  incredible  quantities  of  gold  and 
silver  ($57,000,000,  it  is  said),  the  treasure  of  the  Great  King. 

From  Susa  Alexander's  march  was  next  directed  to  Persepolis, 
where  he  secured  a  treasure  more  than  twice  as  great  ($138,000,- 
000)  as  that  found  at  Susa.  Upon  Persepolis  Alexander  wreaked 
vengeance,  for  all  Greece  had  suffered  at  the  hands  of  the  Per- 
sians. Many  of  the  inhabitants  were  massacred,  and  others  sold 
into  slavery ;  while  the  palaces  of  the  Persian  kings  were  given  to 
the  flames. 

Alexander,  having  thus  overthrown  the  power  of  Darius,  now 
began  to  regard  himself,  not  only  as  his  conqueror,  but  as  his  suc- 
cessor, and  was  thus  looked  upon  by  the  Persians.  He  assumed 
the  pomp  and  state  of  an  Oriental  monarch,  and  required  the  most 
obsequious  homage  from  all  who  approached  him.  His  Greek 
and  Macedonian  companions,  unused  to  paying  such  servile  adula- 
tion to  their  king,  were  much  displeased  at  Alexander's  conduct, 
and  from  this  time  on  to  his  death,  intrigues  and  conspiracies 
were  being  constantly  formed  among  them  against  his  power  and 
life. 

Conquest  of  Bactria.  —  Urged  on  by  an  uncontrollable  desire 
to  possess  himself  of  the  most  remote  countries  of  which  any 


CONQ  UES  TS  IN  INDI.  I.  165 

accounts  had  ever  reached  him,  Alexander  now  led  his  army  to 
the  north,  and,  after  subduing  many  tribes  that  dwelt  about  the 
Caspian  Sea,  boldly  conducted  his  soldiers  over  the  snowy  passes 
of  the  Hindu  Kush,  and  descended  into  the  fair  provinces  of 
Bactria. 

During  the  years  329-328  B.C.  Alexander  conquered  not  only 
Bactria  but  Sogdiana,  a  country  lying  north  of  the  Oxus.  Among 
his  captives  here  was  a  beautiful  Bactrian  princess,  Roxana  by 
name,  who  became  his  bride. 

Alexander's  stay  in  Sogdiana  was  saddened  by  his  murder  of 
his  dearest  friend  Clitus,  who  had  saved  his  life  at  the  Granicus. 
Both  were  flushed  with  wine  when  the  quarrel  arose ;  after  the 
deed,  Alexander  was  overwhelmed  with  remorse. 

Conquests  in  India.  —  With  the  countries  north  of  the  Hindu 
Kush  subdued  and  settled,  Alexander  recrossed  the  mountains, 
and  led  his  army  down  upon  the  rich  and  crowded  plains  of 
India  (327  B.C.).  Here  again  he  showed  himself  invincible,  and 
received  the  submission  of  many  of  the  native  princes. 

The  most  formidable  resistance  encountered  by  the  Macedo- 
nians was  offered  by  a  strong  and  wealthy  king  named  Porus. 
Captured  at  last  and  brought  into  the  presence  of  Alexander,  his 
proud  answer  to  the  conqueror's  question  as  to  how  he  thought  he 
ought  to  be  treated  was,  "  Like  a  king."  The  impulsive  Alexander 
gave  him  back  his  kingdom,  to  be  held,  however,  subject  to  the 
Macedonian  crown. 

Alexander's  desire  was  to  extend  his  conquests  to  the  Ganges, 
but  his  soldiers  began  to  murmur  because  of  the  length  and  hard- 
ness of  their  campaigns,  and  he  reluctantly  gave  up  the  under- 
taking. To  secure  the  conquests  already  made,  he  founded,  at 
different  points  in  the  valley  of  the  Indus,  Greek  towns  and  colo- 
nies. One  of  these  he  named  Alexandria,  after  himself;  another 
Bucephala,  in  memory  of  his  favorite  steed ;  and  still  another 
Nicaea,  for  his  victories.  The  modern  museum  at  Lahore  contains 
many  relics  of  Greek  art,  dug  up  on  the  site  of  these  Macedonian 
cities  and  camps. 


166  EMPIRE    OF  ALEXANDER. 

Alexander's  return  route  lay  through  the  ancient  Gedrosia,  now 
Beluchistan,  a  region  frightful  with  burning  deserts,  amidst  which 
his  soldiers  endured  almost  incredible  privations  and  sufferings. 
After  a  trying  and  calamitous  march  of  over  two  months,  Alexander, 
with  the  survivors  of  his  army,  reached  Carmania.  Here,  to  his 
unbounded  joy,  he  was  joined  by  Nearchus,  thewtrusted  admiral  of 
his  fleet,  whom  he  had  ordered  to  explore  the  sea  between  the 
Indus  and  the  Euphrates. 

To  appropriately  celebrate  his  conquests  and  discoveries,  Alex- 
ander instituted  a  series  of  religious  festivals,  amidst  which  his 
soldiers  forgot  the  dangers  of  their  numberless  battles  and  the 
hardships  of  their  unparalleled  marches,  which  had  put  to  the  test 
every  power  of  human  endurance.  And  well  might  these  veterans 
glory  in  their  achievements.  In  a  few  years  they  had  conquered 
half  the  world,  and  changed  the  whole  course  of  history. 

Plans  and  Death  of  Alexander.  —  As  the  capital  of  his  vast 
empire,  which  now  stretched  from  the  Ionian  Sea  to  the  Indus, 
Alexander  chose  the  ancient  Babylon,  upon  the  Euphrates.  His 
designs  were  to  push  his  conquests  as  far  to  the  west  as  he  had 
extended  them  to  the  east.  Arabia,  Carthage,  Italy,  and  Spain 
were  to  be  added  to  his  already  vast  domains.  Indeed,  the  plans 
of  Alexander  embraced  nothing  less  than  the  union  and  Helleniz- 
ing  of  the  world.  Not  only  were  the  peoples  of  Asia  and  Europe 
to  be  blended  by  means  of  colonies,  but  even  the  floras  of  the 
two  continents  were  to  be  intermingled  by  the  transplanting  of 
fruits  and  trees  from  one  continent  to  the  other.  Common  laws 
and  customs,  a  common  language  and  a  common  religion,  were  to 
unite  the  world  into  one  great  family.  Intermarriages  were  to 
blend  the  races.  Alexander  himself  married  a  daughter  of  Darius 
III.,  and  also  one  of  Artaxerxes  Ochus ;  and  to  ten  thousand  of 
his  soldiers,  whom  he  encouraged  to  take  Asiatic  wives,  he  gave 
magnificent  gifts. 

In  the  midst  of  his  vast  projects,  Alexander  was  seized  by  a 
fever,  brought  on  by  his  insane  excesses,  and  died  at  Babylon,  323 
B.C.,  in  the  thirty-second  year  of  his  age.     His  soldiers  could  not 


RESULTS   OF  ALEXANDER'S   CONQUESTS.  167 

let  him  die  without  seeing  him.  The  watchers  of  the  palace  were 
obliged  to  open  the  doors  to  them,  and  the  veterans  of  a  hundred 
battle-fields  filed  sorrowfully  past  the  couch  of  their  dying  com- 
mander. His  body  was  carried  to  Alexandria,  in  Egypt,  and  there 
enclosed  in  a  golden  coffin,  and  a  splendid  mausoleum  was  raised 
over  it.  His  ambition  for  celestial  honors  was  gratified  in  his 
death ;  for  in  Egypt  and  elsewhere  temples  were  dedicated  to 
him,  and  divine  worship  was  paid  to  his  statues. 

We  cannot  deny  to  Alexander,  in  addition  to  a  remarkable 
genius  for  military  affairs,  a  profound  and  comprehensive  intellect. 
He  had  fine  tastes,  and  liberally  encouraged  art,  science,  and  liter- 
ature. The  artists  of  his  times  had  in  him  a  munificent  patron ; 
and  to  his  preceptor  Aristotle  he  sent  large  collections  of  natural- 
history  objects,  gathered  in  his  extended  expeditions.  He  had  a 
kind  and  generous  nature  :  he  avenged  the  murder  of  his  enemy 
Darius  ;  and  he  repented  in  bitter  tears  over  the  body  of  his  faith- 
ful Clitus.  He  exposed  himself  like  the  commonest  soldier,  shar- 
ing with  his  men  the  hardships  of  the  march  and  the  dangers  of 
the  battle-field. 

But  he  was  self-seeking,  foolishly  vain,  and  madly  ambitious  of 
military  glory.  He  plunged  into  shameful  excesses,  and  gave  way 
to  bursts  of  passion  that  transformed  a  usually  mild  and  generous 
disposition  into  the  fury  of  a  madman.  The  contradictions  of  his 
life  cannot,  perhaps,  be  better  expressed  than  in  the  words  once 
applied  to  the  gifted  Themistocles :  "  He  was  greater  in  genius 
than  in  character." 

Results  of  Alexander's  Conquests. — The  remarkable  conquests 
of  Alexander  had  far-reaching  consequences.  They  ended  the  long 
struggle  between  Persia  and  Greece,  and  spread  Hellenic  civili- 
zation over  Egypt  and  Western  Asia.  The  distinction  between 
Greek  and  Barbarian  was  obliterated,  and  the  sympathies  of  men, 
hitherto  so  narrow  and  local,  were  widened,  and  thus  an  important 
preparation  was  made  for  the  reception  of  the  cosmopolitan  creed 
of  Christianity.     The  world  was  also  given  a  universal  language  of 


, 


168 


EMPIRE   OF  ALEXANDER. 


culture,  which  was  a  further  preparation  for  the  spread  of  Christian 
teachings. 

But  the  evil  effects  of  the  conquest  were  also  positive  and  far- 
reaching.  The  sudden  acquisition  by  the  Greeks  of  the  enormous 
wealth  of  the  Persian  empire,  and  contact  with  the  vices  and  the 
effeminate  luxury  of  the  Oriental  nations,  had  a  most  demoralizing 
effect  upon  Hellenic  life.  Greece  became  corrupt,  and  she  in 
turn  corrupted  Rome.  Thus  the  civilization  of  antiquity  was 
undermined. 

CHRONOLOGICAL  SUMMARY  OF  GRECIAN  HISTORY  TO  THE 
DEATH  OF  ALEXANDER  THE  GREAT. 


Legendary  Age  . 

Early  History  of 
Sparta   .     .     . 


Early  History  of 
Athens.      .     . 


Period  of  Graeco- 
Persian  War  . 


Period  of  Athenian 
Supremacy      .     . 


Events  of  the  Pelo- 
ponnesian  War   . 


Period  of  Spartan 
Supremacy 


The  Trojan  War,  legendary  date  .... 

The  Dorians  enter  the  Peloponnesus,  about 

Lycurgus  gives  laws  to  Sparta .     .  " 

The  Messenian  Wars " 

Rule  of  the  Archons " 

Rebellion  of  Cylon " 

Legislation  of  Solon " 

Pisistratus  rules 

Expulsion  of  the  Pisistratidae 

First  Expedition  of  Darius  (led  by  Mar- 
donius) 

Battle  of  Marathon 

Battle  of  Thermopylae 

Battle  of  Salamis 

Battles  of  Plataea  and  Mycale 

Athens  rebuilt 

Aristides  chosen  first  president  of  the  Con- 
federacy of  Delos 

Themistocles  sent  into  exile 

Ostracism  of  Cimon 

Pericles  at  the  head  of  affairs  —  Periclean 
Age 

Beginning  of  the  Peloponnesian  War    .     . 

Pestilence  at  Athens 

Expedition  against  Syracuse 

Battle  of  ^Egospotami 

Close  of  the  War 

Rule  of  the  Thirty  Tyrants  at  Athens     .     . 

Expedition  of  the  Ten  Thousand  .... 

Peace  of  Antalcidas 

Oligarchy  established  at  Thebes   .... 

Spartan  power  broken  on  the  field  of  Leuc- 
tra 


i i 94-1 184 

1 104 

850 

750-650 

1050-612 

612 

594 
560-527 


492 
490 
480 
480 
479 
478 

477 
47i 
459 

459-431 

43i 
430 
415 
405 
404 

404-403 
401-400 

387 
382 

371 


CHR  ONOL  O GICAL   S  UMMAR  Y. 


169 


Period  of  Theban 
Supremacy 


Period  of  Macedo- 
nian Supremacy. 


Battle  of  Leuctra,  which  secures  the  suprem- 
acy of  Thebes     371 

Battle  of   Mantinea  and  death  of  Epami- 

nondas 362 

Battle  of  Chseronea 338 

Death  of  Philip  of  Macedon 336 

Alexander  crosses  the  Hellespont      .     .     .  334 

Battle  of  Issus 333 

Battle  of  Arbela 331 

Death  of  Alexander  at  Babylon    ....  323 


170  STATES  FORMED   FROM  THE  EMPIRE. 

CHAPTER    XVII. 

STATES  FORMED   FROM  THE  EMPIRE  OF  ALEXANDER. 

Division  of  the  Empire  of  Alexander.  —  There  was  no  one 
who  could  wield  the  sword  that  fell  from  the  hand  of  Alexander. 
It  is  told  that,  when  dying,  being  asked  to  whom  the  kingdom 
should  belong,  he  replied,  "To  the  strongest,"  and  handed  his 
signet  ring  to  his  general  Perdiccas.  But  Perdiccas  was  not  strong 
enough  to  master  the  difficulties  of  the  situation.1  Indeed,  who 
is  strong  enough  to  rule  the  world  ? 

Consequently  the  vast  empire  created  by  Alexander's  unparal- 
leled conquests  was  distracted  by  quarrels  and  wars,  and  before  the 
close  of  the  fourth  century  B.C.,  had  become  broken  into  many 
fragments.  Besides  minor  states,2  four  well-defined  and  important 
monarchies  arose  out  of  the  ruins.  After  the  rearrangement  of 
boundaries  that  followed  the  decisive  battle  of  Ipsus  (fought  in 
Phrygia  301  B.C.),  these  principal  states  had  the  outlines  shown 
by  the  accompanying  map.  Their  rulers  were  Lysimachus,  Seleu- 
cus  Nicator,  Ptolemy,  and  Cassander,  who  had  each  assumed  the 
title  of  king.  The  great  horn  being  broken,  in  its  place  came  up 
four  notable  ones  toward  the  four  winds  of  heaven.3 

1  Perdiccas  ruled  as  regent  for  Philip  Arridseus  (an  illegitimate  brother  of 
Alexander),  who  was  proclaimed  titular  king. 

2  Two  of  these  lesser  states,  Rhodes  and  Pontus,  deserve  special  notice :  — 
Rhodes. — Rhodes  became  the  head  of  a  maritime  confederation  of  the  cities 

and  islands  along  the  coasts  of  Asia  Minor,  and  thus  laid  the  basis  of  a  remarka- 
ble commercial  prosperity  and  naval  power. 

Pontus. —  Pontus  (Greek  for  sea),  a  state  of  Asia  Minor,  was  so  called 
from  its  position  upon  the  Euxine.  It  was  never  thoroughly  conquered  by  the 
Macedonians.  It  has  a  place  in  history  mainly  because  of  the  lustre  shed  upon 
it  by  the  transcendent  ability  of  one  of  its  kings,  Mithridates  the  Great  (120-63 
B.C.),  who  for  a  long  time  made  successful  resistance  to  the  Roman  arms. 

3  Dan.  viii.  8. 


IS                         20                         '5                      30                       35 

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45 

4o 

35 
30 

25 

30 

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/     W  M^  T 

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ikk 

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S    E    ±,E 

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4- 

JO                                    ii                                     40 

45 

THRACE  AND  SYRIA.  171 

Lysiraachus  held  Thrace  and  the  western  part  of  Asia  Minor ; 
Seleucus  Nicator,  Syria  and  the  countries  eastward  to  the  Indus ; 
Ptolemy  ruled  Egypt ;  and  Cassander  governed  Macedonia,  and 
claimed  authority  over  Greece.1 

After  barely  mentioning  the  fate  of  the  kingdom  of  Lysimachus, 
we  will  trace  very  briefly  the  fortunes  of  the  other  three  monarch- 
ies until  they  were  overthrown,  one  after  the  other,  by  the  now 
rapidly  rising  power  of  Rome. 

Thrace,  or  the  Kingdom  of  Lysimachus.  —  The  kingdom  of 
Lysimachus  soon  disappeared.  He  was  defeated  by  Seleucus  in 
the  year  281  B.C.,  and  his  dominions  were  divided.  The  lands 
in  Asia  Minor  were  joined  to  the  Syrian  kingdom,  while  Thrace 
was  absorbed  by  Macedonia. 

Syria,  or  the  Kingdom  of  the  Seleucidae  (312-63  b.c). — 
This  kingdom,  during  the  two  centuries  and  more  of  its  existence, 
played  an  important  part  in  the  political  history  of  the  world. 
Under  its  first  king  it  comprised  nominally  almost  all  the  countries 
of  Asia  conquered  by  Alexander,  thus  stretching  from  the  Helles- 
pont to  the  Indus.  Its  rulers  were  called  Seleucidae,  from  the 
founder  of  the  kingdom,  Seleucus  Nicator. 

Seleucus  Nicator  (312-280  B.C.),  besides  being  a  ruler  of 
unusual  ability,  was  a  most  liberal  patron  of  learning  and  art.  He 
is  declared  to  have  been  "  the  greatest  founder  of  cities  that  ever 
lived."  Throughout  his  dominions  he  founded  a  vast  number, 
some  of  which  endured  for  many  centuries.  Antioch,  on  the 
Orontes,  in  Northern  Syria,  became,  after  Seleucia  on  the  Tigris, 
the  capital  of  the  kingdom,  and  obtained  an  influence  and  renown 
as  a  centre  of  population  and  trade  which  have  given  its  name  a 
sure  place  in  history. 

The  successors  of  Seleucus  Nicator  led  the  kingdom  through 
checkered  fortunes.  On  different  sides  provinces  fell  away  and 
became  independent  states.2    Antiochus  III.  (  2  2  3- 1 8  7  B.C. ),  called 

1  Cassander  never  secured  complete  control  of  Greece,  hence  this  country 
is  not  included  in  his  domains  as  these  appear  upon  the  map. 
1  The  most  important  of  these  were  the  following :  — 
1.   Pergamus.  — This  was  a  state  in  western  Asia  Minor,  which  became 


172 


STATES  FORMED  FROM   THE  EMPIRE. 


COIN    OF   ANTIOCHUS    III.   (THE   GREAT) 


"the  Great,"  raised  the  kingdom  for  a  short  time  into  great  prom- 
inence ;  but  attempting  to  make  conquests  in  Europe,  and  further, 

giving  asylum 
to  the  Cartha- 
ginian general 
Hannibal,  he  in- 
curred the  fatal 
hostility  of 
Rome.  Quickly 
driven  by  the 
Roman  legions 
across  the  Hel- 
lespont, he  was  hopelessly  defeated  at  the  battle  of  Magnesia  ( 1 90 
B.C.).  After  this,  the  Syrian  kingdom  was  of  very  little  importance 
in  the  world's  affairs.  At  last,  brought  again  into  collision  with 
Rome,  the  country  was  overrun  by  Pompey  the  Great,  and  be- 
came a  part  of  the  Roman  Republic,  63  B.C. 

Kingdom  of  the  Ptolemies  in  Egypt  (323- 
30  B.C.).  —  The  Graeco- Egyptian  empire  of 
the  Ptolemies  was  by  far  the  most  impor- 
tant, in  its  influence  upon  the  civilization  of 
the  world,  of  all  the  kingdoms  that  owed 
their  origin  to  the  conquests  of  Alexander. 
The  founder  of  the  house  and  dynasty  was 
Ptolemy  I.,  surnamed  Soter  (323-283  B.C.), 
one  of  Alexander's  ablest  generals.  His  de- 
scendants ruled  in  Egypt  for  nearly  three  centuries,  a  most  impor- 
tant period  in  the  intellectual  life  of  the  world.      Under  Ptolemy 

independent  upon  the  death  of  Seleucus  Nicator  (280  B.C.).  Favored  by  the 
Romans,  it  gradually  grew  into  a  powerful  kingdom,  which  at  one  time 
embraced  a  considerable*  part  of  Asia  Minor.  Its  capital,  also  called  Perga- 
mus,  became  a  most  noted  centre  of  Greek  learning  and  civilization. 

2.  Parthia.  —  Parthia  was  a  powerful  Turanian  state  that  grew  up  east  of 
the  Euphrates  River  (from  about  255  B.C.  to  226  A.D.).  Its  kings  were  at  first 
formidable  enemies  of  the  rulers  of  Syria,  and  later  of  the  Romans,  whom  they 
never  allowed  to  make  any  considerable  conquest  beyond  the  Euphrates. 


PTOLEMY   SOTER. 


KINGDOM  OF   THE  PTOLEMIES.  173 

I.,  Alexandria  became  the  great  depot  of  exchange  for  the  pro- 
ductions of  the  world.  At  the  entrance  of  the  harbor  stood  the 
Pharos,  or  light-house,  —  the  first  structure  of  its  kind,  —  which 
Ptolemy  built  to  guide  the  fleets  of  the  world  to  his  capital.  This 
edifice  was  reckoned  one  of  the  Seven  Wonders. 

But  it  was  not  alone  the  exchange  of  material  products  that  was 
comprehended  in  Ptolemy's  scheme.  His  aim  was  to  make  his 
capital  the  intellectual  centre  of  the  world  —  the  place  where  the 
arts,  sciences,  literatures,  and  even  the  religions,  of  the  world  should 
meet  and  mingle.  He  founded  the  famous  Museum,  a  sort  of  col- 
lege, which  became  the  "  University  of  the  East,"  and  established 
the  renowned  Alexandrian  Library.  Poets,  artists,  philosophers, 
and  teachers  in  all  departments  of  learning  were  encouraged  to 
settle  in  Alexandria  by  the  conferring  of  immunities  and  privileges, 
and  by  gifts  and  munificent  patronage.  His  court  embraced  the 
learning  and  genius  of  the  age. 

Ptolemy  II.,  Philadelphus  (283-247  B.C.),  followed  closely  in  the 
footsteps  of  his  father,  carrying  out,  as  far  as  possible,  the  plans 
and  policies  of  the  preceding  reign.  Under  his  successor,  Ptol- 
emy III.,  Euergetes  (247-242  B.C.),  the  dominions  of  the  Ptolemies 
touched  their  widest  limits ;  while  the  capital  Alexandria  reached 
the  culminating  point  in  her  fame  as  the  centre  of  Hellenistic 
civilization. 

Altogether  the  Ptolemies  reigned  in  Egypt  almost  exactly  three 
centuries  (323-30  B.C.).  Those  rulers  who  held  the  throne  for  the 
last  two  hundred  years  were,  with  few  exceptions,  a  succession  of 
monsters,  such  as  even  Rome  in  her  worst  days  could  scarcely 
equal.  The  usage  of  intermarriage  among  the  members  of  the 
royal  family,  —  a  usage  in  which  the  Ptolemies  followed  what  was 
a  custom  of  the  ancient  Pharaohs,  —  led  to  endless  family  quarrels, 
which  resulted  in  fratricide,  matricide,  and  all  the  dark  deeds  in- 
cluded in  the  calendar  of  royal  crime.  The  story  of  the  renowned 
Cleopatra,  the  last  of  the  house  of  the  Ptolemies,  will  be  told  in 
connection  with  Roman  history,  to  which  it  properly  belongs. 

Macedonia  and  Greece.  —  From  the  time  of  the  subjection  of 


174  STATES  FORMED  FROM   THE  EMPIRE. 

Greece  by  Philip  and  Alexander  to  the  absorption  of  Macedonia 
into  the  growing  dominions  of  Rome,  the  Greek  cities  of  the  penin- 
sula were  very  much  under  the  control  or  influence  of  the  Mace- 
donian kings.  But  the  Greeks  were  never  made  for  royal  subjects, 
and  consequently  they  were  in  a  state  of  chronic  revolt  against  this 
foreign  authority.  «► 

Thus,  no  sooner  had  they  heard  of  the  death  of  Alexander  than 
several  of  the  Grecian  states  rose  against  the  Macedonian  general 
Antipater,  and  carried  on  with  him  what  is  known  as  the  Lamian 
War  (323-321  B.C.).  The  struggle  ended  disastrously  for  the 
Greeks,  and  Demosthenes,  who  had  been  the  soul  of  the  move- 
ment, was  forced  to  flee  from  Athens.  He  took  refuge  upon  an 
island  just  off  the  coast  of  the  Peloponnesus ;  but  being  still  hunted 
by  Antipater,  he  put  an  end  to  his  own  life  by  means  of  poison. 


THE  DYING   GAUL. 

The  next  matter  of  moment  in  the  history  of  Macedonia,  was 
an  invasion  of  the  Gauls  (279  B.C.),  kinsmen  of  the  Celtic  tribes 
that  about  a  century  before  this  time  had  sacked  the  city  of  Rome. 
These  savage  marauders  inflicted  terrible  suffering  upon  both  Mace- 
donia and  Greece.  But  they  were  at  last  expelled  from  Europe, 
and  settling  in  Asia  Minor,  they  there  gave  name  to  the  province 
of  Galatia.      The  celebrated  Greek  sculpture,  The  Dying  Gaul, 


conclusion:  175 

popularly  but  erroneously  called  The  Dying  Gladiator,  is  a  most 
interesting  memorial  of  this  episode  in  Greek  history. 

Macedonia  finally  came  in  contact  with  a  new  enemy  —  the 
great  military  republic  of  the  West.  For  lending  aid  to  Carthage 
in  the  Second  Punic  War,  she  incurred  the  anger  of  Rome,  which 
resulted,  after  much  intrigue  and  hard  fighting,  in  the  country 
being  brought  into  subjection  to  the  Italian  power.  In  the  year 
146  b.c.  it  was  erected  into  a  Roman  province. 

The  political  affairs  of  Greece  proper  during  the  period  we  are 
considering  were  chiefly  comprehended  in  the  fortunes  of  two  con- 
federacies, or  leagues,  one  of  which  was  called  the  Achaean,  and 
the  other  the  /Etolian  League.  United,  these  two  confederacies 
might  have  maintained  the  political  independence  of  Greece  ;  but 
that  spirit  of  dissension  which  we  have  seen  to  be  the  bane  of  the 
Hellenic  peoples  caused  them  to  become,  in  the  hands  of  intrigu- 
ing Rome,  weapons  first  for  crushing  Macedonia,  and  then  for 
grinding  each  other  to  pieces.  Finally,  in  the  year  146  B.C.,  the 
splendid  city  of  Corinth  was  taken  by  the  Roman  army  and  laid 
in  ashes.  This  was  the  last  act  in  the  long  and  varied  drama  of 
the  political  life  of  ancient  Greece.  Henceforth  it  constituted 
simply  a  portion  of  the  Roman  Empire. 

Conclusion.  —  We  have  now  traced  the  political  fortunes  of  the 
Hellenic  race  through  about  seven  centuries  of  authentic  history. 
In  succeeding  chapters  it  will  be  our  pleasanter  task  to  trace  the 
more  brilliant  and  worthy  fortunes  of  the  artistic  and  intellectual 
life  of  Hellas,  —  to  portray,  though  necessarily  in  scanty  outline,  the 
achievements  of  that  wonderful  genius  which  enabled  her,  "  cap- 
tured, to  lead  captive  her  captor." 


176 


GREEK  ARCHITECTURE. 


CHAPTER    XVIII. 

GREEK  ARCHITECTURE,   SCULPTURE,  AND  PAINTING. 

The  Greek  Sense  of  Beauty. — The  Greeks  were  artists  by 
nature.  "Ugliness  gave  them  pain  like  a  blow."  Everything 
they  made  was  beautiful.  Beauty  they  placed  next  to  holiness ; 
indeed,  they  almost  or  quite  made  beauty  and  right  the  same 
thing.  They  are  said  to  have  thought  it  strange  that  Socrates  was 
good,  seeing  he  was  so  unprepossessing  in  appearance. 


PELASGIAN    MASONRY. 


i.   Architecture. 

Pelasgian  Architecture.  —  The  term  Pelasgian  is  applied  to 
various  structures  of  massive  masonry  found  in  different  parts 
of  Greece,  Italy,  and  Asia  Minor.  The  origin  of  these  works 
was  a  mystery  to  the  earliest  Hellenes,  who  ascribed  them  to 
a  race  of  giants  called  Cyclops ;  hence  the  name  Cyclopean  that 
also  attaches  to  them. 

These  works  exhibit  three  well-defined  stages  of  development. 


ORDERS   OF  ARCHITECTURE. 


77 


In  the  earliest  and  rudest  structures  the  stones  are  gigantic  in  size 
and  untouched  by  the  chisel ;  in  the  next  oldest  the  stones  are 
worked  into  irregular  polygonal  blocks ;  while  in  the  latest  the 
blocks  are  cut  into  rectangular  shapes  and  laid  in  regular  courses. 
The  walls  of  the  old  citadels  or  castles  of  several  Grecian  cities 
exhibit  specimens  of  this  primitive  architecture  (see  p.  90) . 

Orders  of  Architecture. — There  are  three  styles,  or  orders,  of 
Grecian  architecture  —  the  Doric,  the  Ionic,  and  the  Corinthian. 
They  are  distinguished  from  one  another  chiefly  by  differences  in 
the  proportions  and  ornamentation  of  the  column. 


The  Doric  column  is  without  a  base,  and  has  a  simple  and  mas- 
sive capital.  At  first  the  Doric  temples  of  the  Greeks  were  almost 
as  massive  as  the  Egyptian  temples,  but  later  they  became  more 
refined. 

*  The  Ionic  column  is  characterized  by  the  spiral  volutes  of  the 
capital.  This  form  was  borrowed  from  the  Assyrians,  and  was 
principally  employed  by  the  Greeks  of  Ionia,  whence  its  name. 

The  Corinthian  order  is  distinguished  by  its  rich  capital,  formed 
of  acanthus  leaves.  This  type  is  made  up  of  Egyptian,  Assyrian, 
and  Grecian  elements.  The  addition  of  the  acanthus  leaves  is 
said  to  have  been  suggested  to  the  artist  Callimachus  by  the  pretty 
effect  of  a  basket  surrounded  by  the  leaves  of  an  acanthus  plant, 
upon  which  it  had  accidentally  fallen. 

The  entire  structure  was  made  to  harmonize  with  its  supporting 


178 


GREEK  ARCHITECTURE. 


CORINTHIAN    CAPITAL. 


columns.    The   general  characteristics  of  the  several  orders  are 
well  portrayed  by  the  terms  we  use  when  we  speak  of  the  "stern" 

Doric,  the  "graceful"  Ionic, 
and  the  "  ornate  "  Corinthian. 
Temple  of  Diana  at  Ephe- 
sus.  —  The  temple  of  Diana 
at  Ephesus  was  regarded  as 
one  of  the  wonders  of  the 
world.  The  original  struc- 
ture was  commenced  about 
the  beginning  of  the  sixth 
century  B.C.,  and,  according 
to  Pliny,  was  one  hundred 
and  twenty  years  in  process 
of  building.  Crcesus  gave 
liberally  of  his  wealth  to  or- 
nament the  shrine. 

In  the  year  356  B.C.,  on  the 
same  night,  it  is  said,  that 
Alexander  was  born,  an  ambitious  youth,  named  Herostratus,  fired 
the  building,  simply  to  immortalize  his  name.  Alexander  offered  to 
rebuild  the  temple,  provided  that  he  be  allowed  to  inscribe  his 
name  upon  it.  The  Ephesians  gracefully  declined  the  proposal  by 
replying  that  it  was  not  right  for  one  deity  to  erect  a  temple  to 
another.  Alexander  was  obliged  to  content  himself  with  placing 
within  the  shrine  his  own  portrait  by  Apelles  —  a  piece  of  work 
which  cost  $30,000.  The  value  of  the  gifts  to  the  temple  was 
beyond  all  calculation  :  kings  and  states  vied  with  one  another  in 
splendid  donations.  Painters  and  sculptors  were  eager  to  have 
their  masterpieces  assigned  a  place  within  its  walls,  so  that  it 
became  a  great  national  gallery  of  paintings  and  statuary. 

So  inviolable  was  the  sanctity  of  the  temple  that  at  all  times, 
and  especially  in  times  of  tumult  and  danger,  property  and  treas- 
ures were  carried  to  it  as  a  safe  repository.1     But  the  riches  of  the 

1  The  Grecian  temples  were,  in  a  certain  sense,  banks  of  deposit.  They 
contained  special  chambers  or  vaults  for  the  safe-keeping  of  valuables.     The 


THE  DELPHIAN   TEMPLE.  179 

sanctuary  proved  too  great  a  temptation  to  the  Roman  emperor 
Nero.  He  risked  incurring  the  anger  of  the  great  Diana,  and 
robbed  the  temple  of  many  statues  and  a  vast  amount  of  gold. 
Later  (in  262  a.d.),  the  barbarian  Goths  enriched  themselves  with 
the  spoils  of  the  shrine,  and  left  it  a  ruin. 

The  Delphian  Temple.  —  The  first  temple  erected  at  Delphi 
over  the  spot  whence  issued  the  mysterious  vapors  (see.  p.  105)  was 
a  rude  wooden  structure.  In  the  year  548  B.C.,  the  temple  then 
standing  was  destroyed  by  fire.  All  the  cities  and  states  of  Hellas 
contributed  to  its  rebuilding.  Even  the  king  of  Egypt,  Amasis, 
sent  a  munificent  gift.  More  than  half  a  million  of  dollars  was 
collected ;  for  the  temple  was  to  exceed  in  magnificence  anything 
the  world  had  yet  seen.  It  will  be  recalled  that  the  Athenian 
Alcmaeonidae  were  the  contractors  who  undertook  the  rebuilding 
of  the  shrine  (see  p.  122). 

The  temple  was  crowded  with  the  spoils  of  many  battle-fields, 
with  the  rich  gifts  of  kings,  and  with  rare  works  of  art.  Like  the 
temple  at  Ephesus,  the  Delphian  shrine,  after  remaining  for  many 
years  secure,  through  the  awe  and  reverence  which  its  oracle 
inspired,  suffered  frequent  spoliation.  The  greed  of  conquerors 
overcame  all  religious  scruples.  The  Phocians  robbed  the  temple 
of  a  treasure  equivalent,  it  is  estimated,  to  more  than  $  10,000,000 
with  us  (see  p.  160)  ;  and  Nero  plundered  it  of  five  hundred 
bronze  images.    But  Constantine  (emperor  of  Rome  306-337  a.d., 

heaps  of  gold  and  silver  relics  discovered  by  Di  Cesnola  at  Sunium,  in  the 
island  of  Cyprus,  were  found  in  the  secret  subterranean  vaults  of  a  great  temple. 
The  priests  often  loaned  out  on  interest  the  money  deposited  with  them,  the 
revenue  from  this  source  being  added  to  that  from  the  leased  lands  of  the  tem- 
ple and  from  the  tithes  of  war  booty,  to  meet  the  expenses  of  the  services  of 
the  shrine.  Usually  the  temple  property  in  Greece  was  managed  solely  by  the 
priests;  but  the  treasure  of  the  Parthenon  at  Athens  formed  an  exception  to 
this  rule.  The  treasure  here  belonged  to  the  state,  and  was  controlled  and 
disposed  of  by  the  voto  of  the  people.  Even  the  personal  property  of  the  god- 
dess, the  gold  drapery  of  the  statue  (see  p.  185),  which  was  worth  about  $600,- 
000,  could  be  used  in  case  of  great  need,  but  it  must  be  replaced  in  due  time, 
with  a  fair  interest. 


180  GREEK  ARCHITECTURE. 

and  founder  of  Constantinople)  was  the  Nebuchadnezzar  who  bore 
off  the  sacred  vessels  and  many  statues  as  trophies  to  his  new 
capital  then  rising  on  the  Hellespont. 

The  Athenian  Acropolis  and  the  Parthenon.  —  In  the  history 
of  art  there  is  no  other  spot  in  the  world  possessed  of  such  in- 
terest as  the  flat-topped  rock,  already  described  (see  p.  118), 
which  constituted  the  Athenian  Acropolis.  We  have  seen  that  in 
early  times  the  eminence  was  used  as  a  stronghold.  But  by  the 
fifth  century  B.C.  the  city  had  slipped  down  upon  the  plain,  and 
the  summit  of  the  rock  was  consecrated  to  the  temples  and  the 
worship  of  the  deities,  and  came  to  be  called  "  the  city  of  the 
gods."     During  the  period  of  Athenian  supremacy,  especially  in 


ATHENIAN   YOUTH    IN    PROCESSION.     (From  the  Frieze  of  the  Parthenon.) 

the  Periclean  Age,  Hellenic  genius  and  piety  adorned  this  spot 
with  temples  and  statues  that  all  the  world  has  pronounced  to  be 
faultless  specimens  of  beauty  and  taste. 

The  most  celebrated  of  the  buildings  upon  the  Acropolis  was 
the  Parthenon,  the  "  Residence  of  the  virgin-goddess  Athena." 
This  is  considered  the  finest  specimen  of  Greek  architecture.  It 
was  designed  by  the  architect  Ictinus,  but  the  sculptures  that 
adorned  it  were  the  work  of  the  celebrated  Phidias.1     It  was  built 

1  The  subject  of  the  wonderful  frieze  running  round  the  temple  was  the  pro- 
cession which  formed  the  most  important  feature  of  the  Athenian  festival 


182  GREEK  ARCHITECTURE. 

in  the  Doric  order,  of  marble  from  the  neighboring  Pentelicus. 
After  standing  for  more  than  two  thousand  years,  and  having  served 
successively  as  a  Pagan  temple,  a  Christian  church,  and  a  Moham- 
medan mosque,  it  finally  was  made  to  serve  as  a  Turkish  powder- 
magazine,  in  a  war  with  the  Venetians,  in  1687.  During  the 
progress  of  this  contest  a  bomb  fired  the  magazine,  and  more 
than  half  of  this  masterpiece  of  ancient  art  was  shivered  into 
fragments.  The  front  is  nearly  perfect,  and  is  the  most  prominent 
feature  of  the  Acropolis  at  the  present  time. 

The  Mausoleum  at  Halicarnassus.  — This  structure  was  another 
of  the  Seven  Wonders  of  the  World.  It  was  a  monumental  tomb 
designed  to  preserve  the  memory  of  Mausolus,  king  of  Caria,  who 
died  353  B.C.  Its  erection  was  prompted  by  the  love  and  grief  of 
his  wife  Artemisia.  The  combined  genius  of  the  most  noted  artists 
of  the  age  executed  the  wish  of  the  queen.  It  is  the  traditions  of 
this  beautiful  structure  that  have  given  the  world  a  name  for  all 
magnificent  monuments  raised  to  perpetuate  the  memory  of  the 
dead. 

Theatres.  — The  most  noted  of  Greek  theatres  was  the  Theatre 
of  Dionysus  at  Athens,  which  was  the  model  of  all  the  others.  It 
was  semi-circular  in  form,  and  was  partly  cut  in  the  rock  on  the 
southeastern  slope  of  the  Acropolis,  the  Greeks  in  the  construction 
of  their  theatres  generally  taking  advantage  of  a  hillside.  There 
were  about  one  hundred  rows  of  seats,  the  lowest  one,  bordering 
the  orchestra,  consisting  of  sixty-seven  marble  arm-chairs.  The 
structure  would  hold  thirty  thousand  spectators. 

2.   Sculpture  and  Painting. 

Progress  in  Sculpture:   Influence  of  the  Gymnastic  Art. — 

Wood  was  the  material  first  employed  by  the  Greek  artists.    About 

known  as  the  Great  Panathensea,  which  was  celebrated  every  four  years  in 
honor  of  the  patron-goddess  of  Athens.  The  larger  part  of  the  frieze  is  now 
in  the  British  Museum,  the  Parthenon  having  been  despoiled  of  its  coronal  of 
sculptures  by  Lord  Elgin.  Read  Lord  Byron's  The  Curse  of  Minerva.  To 
the  poet,  Lord  Elgin's  act  appeared  worse  than  vandalism. 


184 


SCULPTURE  AND  PAINTING. 


the  eighth  century  b.c.  bronze  and  marble  were  generally  substi- 
tuted for  the  less  durable  material.  With  this  change  sculpture 
began   to    make   rapid   progress. 

But  what  exerted  the  most 
positive  influence  upon  Greek 
sculpture  was  the  gymnastic  art. 
The  exercises  of  the  gymnasium 
and  the  contests  of  the  sacred 
games  afforded  the  artist  unri- 
valled opportunities  for  the  study 
of  the  human  form.  "  The  whole 
race,"  as  Symonds  says,  "lived 
out  its  sculpture  and  its  painting, 
rehearsed,  as  it  were,  the  great 
works  of  Phidias  and  Polygnotus, 
in  physical  exercises,  before  it 
learned  to  express  itself  in  marble 
or  in  color." 

As  the  sacred  buildings  in- 
creased in  number  and  costliness, 
the  services  of  the  artist  were 
called  into  requisition  for  their 
adornment.  At  first  the  temple 
held  only  the  statue  of  the  god  ; 
but  after  a  time  it  became,  as  we  have  already  seen,  a  sort  of  na- 
tional museum.  The  entablature,  the  pediments,  and  every  niche 
of  the  interior  of  the  shrine,  as  well  as  the  surrounding  grounds 
and  groves,  were  peopled  with  statues  and  groups  of  figures,  ex- 
ecuted by  the  most  renowned  artists,  and  representing  the  national 
deities,  the  legendary  heroes,  victors  at  the  public  games,  or  inci- 
dents in  the  life  of  the  state  in  which  piety  saw  the  special  inter- 
position of  the  god  in  whose  honor  the  shrine  had  been  reared. 

Phidias.  —  Among  all  the  great  sculptors  of  antiquity,  Phidias 
stands  pre-eminent.  He  was  an  Athenian,  and  was  born  about 
488  B.C.     He  delighted  in  the  beautiful  myths  and  legends  of  the 


PITCHING   THE    DISCUS,    OR    QUOIT 
(Discobolus.) 


PHIDIAS. 


185 


Heroic  Age,  and  from  these  he  drew 
subjects  for  his  art.  It  was  his 
genius  that  created  the  wonderful 
figures  of  the  pediments  and  the 
frieze  of  the  Parthenon. 

The  most  celebrated  of  his  colos- 
sal sculptures  were  the  statue  of 
Athena  within  the  Parthenon,  and 
that  of  Olympian  Zeus  in  the  temple 
at  Olympia.  The  statue  of  Athena 
was  of  gigantic  size,  being  about 
forty  feet  in  height,  and  was  con- 
structed of  ivory  and  gold,  the  hair, 
weapons,  and  drapery  being  of  the 
latter  material. 

The  statue  of  Olympian  Zeus  was 
also  of  ivory  and  gold.  It  was  sixty 
feet  high,  and  represented  the  god 
seated  on  his  throne.  The  hair, 
beard,  and  drapery  were  of  gold. 
The  eyes  were  brilliant  stones. 
Gems  of  great  value  decked  the 
throne,  and  figures  of  exquisite 
design  were  sculptured  on  the  gold- 
en robe.  The  colossal  proportions 
of  this  wonderful  work,  as  well  as 
the  lofty  yet  benign  aspect  of  the 
countenance,  harmonized  well  with 
the  popular  conception  of  the  maj- 


ATHENA    PARTHENOS. 


After  a  statue  found  at  Athens  in  1880,  which 
is  supposed  to  be  a  copy  of  the  colossal 
esty  and     grace    Of    the    "  father    Of  statue  of   Athena  by  Phidias,  de- 

,  ,  ,,       _  ,  .  _  scribed  in  the  text. 

gods  and  men.       It  was  thought  a 

great  misfortune  to  die  without  having  seen  the  Olympian  Zeus.1 

1  Phidias  avowed  that  he  took  his  idea  from  the  representation  which 
Homer  gives  in  the  first  hook  of  the  Iliad  in  the  passage  thus  translated  by 
Pope:  — 


186  SCULPTURE  AND  PAINTING. 

The  statue  was  in  existence  for  eight  hundred  years,  being  finally 
destroyed  by  fire  in  the  fifth  century  a.d. 

Phidias  also  executed  other  works 
in  both  bronze  and  marble.  He 
met  an  unworthy  fate.  Upon  the 
famous  shield  at  the  feet  of  the 
statue  of  Athena  in  the  Parthenon, 
among  the  figures  in  the  represen- 
tation of  a  battle  between  the  Athe- 
nians and  the  Amazons,  Phidias 
introduced  a  portrait  of  himself 
and  also  one  of  his  patron  Pericles. 
The  enemies  of  the  artist  caused 
head  of  the  olympian  zeus  by  him  to  be  prosecuted  for  this,  which 
phidias.  was  considered  an  act  of  sacrilege. 

He  died  in  prison  (432  B.C.). 
Polycletus. — At  the  same  time  that  Phidias  was  executing  his 
ideal  representations  of  the  gods,  Polycletus  the  elder,  whose  home 
was  at  Argos,  was  producing  his  renowned  bron  e  statues  of  ath- 
letes. Among  his  pieces  was  one  representing  a  spear-bearer, 
which  was  so  perfect  as  to  be  known  as  "  the  Rule." 

Praxiteles.  —  This  artist,  after  Polycletus,  stands  next  to  Phid- 
ias as  one  of  the  most  eminent  of  Greek  sculptors.  His  works 
were  executed  during  the  fourth  century  B.C.  Among  his  chief 
pieces  may  be  mentioned  the  "  Cnidian  Aphrodite."  This  stood 
in  the  Temple  of  Aphrodite  at  Cnidus,  and  was  regarded  by  the 
ancients  as  the  most  perfect  embodiment  of  the  goddess  of  beauty. 
Pilgrimages  were  made  from  distant  countries  to  Cnidus  for  the 
sake  of  looking  upon  the  matchless  statue. 

Lysippus. — This  artist  is  renowned  for  his  works  in  bronze. 

1  He  spake,  and  awful  bends  his  sable  brow, 
Shakes  his  ambrosial  curls,  and  gives  the  nod, 
The  stamp  of  fate,  and  sanction  of  the  god. 
High  heaven  with  reverence  the  dread  signal  took, 
And  all  Olympus  to  the  centre  shook." 

Bulfinch's  Age  of  Fable. 


THE  RHODIAM  COLOSSUS.  187 

He  flourished  about  the  middle  of  the  fourth  century  b.c.  His 
statues  were  in  great  demand.  Many  of  these  were  of  colossal 
size.  Alexander  gave  the  artist  many  orders  for  statues  of  him- 
self, and  also  of  the  heroes  that  fell  in  his  campaigns. 


THE    LAOCOON    GROUP. 


The  Rhodian  Colossus  and  Schools  of  Art.  —  The  most  noted 
pupil  of  Lysippus  was  Chares,  who  gave  to  the  world  the  cele- 
brated Colossus  at  Rhodes  (about  280  B.C.).  This  was  another  of 
the  wonders  of  the  world.     Its  height  was  about  one  hundred  and 


188  SCULPTURE  AND  PAINTING. 

seven  feet,  and  a  man  could  barely  encircle  with  his  arms  the  thumb 
of  the  statue.1  After  standing  little  more  than  half  a  century,  it 
was  overthrown  by  an  earthquake.  For  nine  hundred  years  the 
Colossus  then  lay,  like  a  Homeric  god,  prone  upon  the  ground. 
Finally,  the  Arabs,  having  overrun  this  part  of  the  Orient  (a.d. 
672),  appropriated  the  statue,  and  thriftily  sold  jit  to  a  Jewish  mer- 
chant. It  is  said  that  it  required  a  train  of  nine  hundred  camels 
to  bear  away  the  bronze. 

This  gigantic  piece  of  statuary  was  not  a  solitary  one  at  Rhodes  ; 
for  that  city,  next  after  Athens,  was  the  great  art  centre  of  the 
Grecian  world.  Its  streets  and  gardens  and  public  edifices  were 
literally  crowded  with  statues.  The  island  became  the  favorite 
resort  of  artists,  and  the  various  schools  there  founded  acquired  a 
wide  renown.  Many  of  the  most  prized  works  of  Grecian  art  in 
our  modern  museums  were  executed  by  members  of  these  Rhodian 
schools.  The  "  Laocoon  Group,"  found  at  Rome  in  1506,  and 
now  in  the  Museum  of  the  Vatican,  is  generally  thought  to  be  the 
work  of  three  Rhodian  sculptors. 

Greek  Painting.  —  Although  the  Greek  artists  attained  a  high 
degree  of  excellence  in  painting,  still  they  probably  never  brought 
the  art  to  the  perfection  which  they  reached  in  sculpture.  One 
reason  for  this  was  that  paintings  were  never,  like  statues,  objects 
of  adoration ;  hence  less  attention  was  directed  to  them. 

With  the  exception  of  antique  vases  and  a  few  patches  of  mural 
decoration,  all  specimens  of  Greek  painting  have  perished.  Con- 
sequently our  knowledge  of  Greek  painting  is  derived  chiefly  from 
the  descriptions  of  renowned  works,  by  the  ancient  writers,  and 
their  anecdotes  of  great  painters. 

Polygnotus.  —  Polygnotus  (flourished  475-455  b.c.)  has  been 
called  the  Prometheus  of  painting,  because  he  was  the  first  to  give 
fire  and  animation  to  the  expression  of  the  countenance.  "  In  his 
hand,"  it  is  affirmed,  "  the  human   features  became  for  the  first 

1  The  statue  was  not  as  large  as  the  Statue  of  Liberty  in  New  York  har- 
bor.    The  height  of  the  latter  is  151  feet. 


ZEUXIS  AND  PARRHASWS.  189 

time  the  mirror  of  the  soul."  Of  a  Polyxena1  painted  by  this 
great  master,  it  was  said  that  "she  carried  in  her  eyelids  the 
whole  history  of  the  Trojan  War." 

Zeuxis  and  Parrhasius.  —  These  great  artists  lived  and  painted 
about  400  B.C.  A  favorite  and  familiar  story  preserves  their  names 
as  companions,  and  commemorates  their  rival  genius.  Zeuxis, 
such  is  the  story,  painted  a  cluster  of  grapes  which  so  closely  imi- 
tated the  real  fruit  that  the  birds  pecked  at  them.  His  rival,  for 
his  piece,  painted  a  curtain.  Zeuxis  asked  Parrhasius  to  draw 
aside  the  veil  and  exhibit  his  picture.  "  I  confess  I  am  surpassed," 
generously  admitted  Zeuxis  to  his  rival ;  "  I  deceived  birds,  but 
you  have  deceived  the  eyes  of  an  experienced  artist." 

Apelles.  —  Apelles,  who  has  been  called  the  "  Raphael  of  an- 
tiquity," was  the  court-painter  of  Alexander  the  Great.  He  was 
such  a  consummate  master  of  the  art  of  painting,  and  carried  it  to 
such  a  state  of  perfection,  that  the  ancient  writers  spoke  of  it  as 
the  "  art  of  Apelles." 

That  Apelles,  like  Zeuxis  and  Parrhasius,  painted  life-like  pictures 
is  shown  by  the  following  story.  In  a  contest  between  him  and 
some  rival  artists,  horses  were  the  objects  represented.  Perceiving 
that  the  judges  were  unfriendly  to  him,  and  partial,  Apelles  insisted 
that  less  prejudiced  judges  should  pronounce  upon  the  merit  of 
the  respective  pieces,  demanding,  at  the  same  time,  that  the  paint- 
ings should  be  shown  to  some  horses  that  were  near.  When 
brought  before  the  pictures  of  his  rival,  the  horses  exhibited  no 
concern ;  but  upon  being  shown  the  painting  of  Apelles,  they 
manifested  by  neighing  and  other  intelligent  signs  their  instant 
recognition  of  the  companions  the  great  master  had  created. 

Note.  —  Recent  excavations  (1878-1886)  on  the  site  of  ancient  Pergamus, 
in  Asia  Minor,  have  brought  to  light  a  great  Altar,  dating  seemingly  from  the 
second  century  B.C.,  whose  sides  were  decorated  with  gigantic  sculptures  rep- 
resenting the  Battle  of  the  Giants  against  the  Gods.  The  sculptures,  which  by 
some  are  placed  next  to  those  of  the  Parthenon,  are  now  in  the  Berlin  Museum. 

1  Polyxena  was  a  daughter  of  the  Trojan  Priam,  famous  for  her  beauty  and 
her  sufferings. 


190  GREEK  LITERATURE. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

GREEK   LITERATURE, 
i.  Epic  and  Lyric  Poetry. 

The  Greeks  as  Literary  Artists.  —  It  was  that  same  exquisite 
sense  of  fitness  and  proportion  and  beauty  which  made  the  Greeks 
artists  in  marble  that  also  made  them  artists  in  language.  "  Of 
all  the  beautiful  things  which  they  created,"  says  Professor  Jebb, 
"  their  own  language  was  the  most  beautiful."  This  language  they 
wrought  into  epics,  lyrics,  dramas,  histories,  and  orations  as  in- 
comparable in  form  and  beauty  as  their  temples  and  statues. 

The  Homeric  Poems.  —  The  earliest  specimens  of  Greek  poetry 
are  the  so-called  "  Homeric  poems,"  consisting  of  the  Iliad  and 
the  Odyssey.  The  subject  of  the  Iliad  (from  Ilios,  Troy)  is  the 
"Wrath  of  Achilles."  The  Odyssey  tells  of  the  long  wanderings 
of  the  hero  Odysseus  (Ulysses)  up  and  down  over  many  seas 
while  seeking  his  native  Ithaca,  after  the  downfall  of  Ilios.  These 
poems  exerted  an  incalculable  influence  upon  the  literary  and 
religious  life  of  the  Hellenic  race. 

The  Iliad  must  be  pronounced  the  world's  greatest  epic.  It 
has  been  translated  into  all  languages,  and  has  been  read  with 
an  ever  fresh  interest  by  generation  after  generation  for  nearly 
3000  years.  Alexander,  it  is  told,  slept  with  a  copy  beneath  his 
pillow,  —  a  copy  prepared  especially  for  him  by  his  preceptor 
Aristotle,  and  called  the  "  casket  edition,"  from  the  jewelled  box 
in  which  Alexander  is  said  to  have  kept  it.  We  preserve  it  quite 
as  sacredly  in  all  our  courses  of  classical  study.  The  poem  has 
made  warriors  as  well  as  poets.  It  incited  the  military  ambition 
of  Alexander,  of  Hannibal,  and  of  Caesar ;  it  inspired  Virgil,  Dante, 
and  Milton.     All  epic  writers  have  taken  it  as  their  model. 


THE  HOMERIC  POEMS. 


191 


Date  and  Authorship  of  the  Homeric  Poems.  — Until  the  rise 
of  modern  German  criticism,  the  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey  were  almost 
universally  ascribed  to  a  sin- 
gle bard  named  Homer,  who 
was  believed  to  have  lived 
about  the  middle  of  the  ninth 
or  tenth  century  B.C.,  one  or 
two  centuries  after  the  events 
commemorated  in  his  poems. 
Though  tradition  represents 
many  cities  as  contending  for 
the  honor  of  having  been  his 
birthplace,  still  he  was  gen- 
erally regarded  as  a  native  of 
Smyrna,  in  Asia  Minor.  He 
travelled  widely  (so  it  was 
believed),  lost  his  sight,  and 
then,  as  a  wandering  minstrel, 
sang  his  immortal  verses 
to  admiring  listeners  in  the  homer. 

different  cities  of  Hellas. 

But  it  is  now  the  opinion  of  many  scholars  that  the  Iliad  and 
the  Odyssey,  as  they  stand  to-day,  are  not,  either  of  them,  the 
creation  of  a  single  poet.  They  are  believed  to  be  mosaics  ;  that 
is,  to  be  built  up  out  of  the  fragments  of  an  extensive  ballad  litera- 
ture that  grew  up  in  an  age  preceding  the  Homeric.  The  "  Wrath 
of  Achilles,"  which  forms  the  nucleus  of  the  Iliad  as  we  have  it, 
may,  with  very  great  probability,  be  ascribed  to  Homer,  whom  we 
may  believe  to  have  been  the  most  prominent  of  a  brotherhood  of 
bards  who  flourished  about  850  or  750  B.C. 

The  Hesiodic  Poems.  —  Hesiod,  who  lived  a  century  or  more 
after  the  age  that  gave  birth  to  the  Homeric  poems,  was  the  poet 
of  nature  and  of  real  life,  especially  of  peasant  life,  in  the  dim 
transition  age  of  Hellas.  The  Homeric  bards  sing  of  the  deeds 
of  heroes,  and  of  a  far-away  time  when  gods  mingled  with  men. 


192  GREEK  LITERATURE. 

Hesiod  sings  of  common  men,  and  of  every-day,  present  duties. 
His  greatest  poem,  a  didactic  epic,  is  entitled  Works  and  Days. 
This  is,  in  the  main,  a  sort  of  farmers'  calendar,  in  which  the  poet 
points  out  to  the  husbandman  the  lucky  and  unlucky  days  for 
doing  certain  kinds  of  work,  eulogizes  industry,  and  intersperses 
among  all  his  practical  lines  homely  maxims  of  morality  and  beauti- 
ful descriptive  passages  of  the  changing  seasons. 

Lyric  Poetry :  Pindar.  —  The  iEolian  island  of  Lesbos  was  the 
hearth  and  home  of  the  earlier  lyric  poets.  Among  the  earliest  of 
the  Lesbian  singers  was  the  poetess  Sappho,  whom  the  Greeks 
exalted  to  a  place  next  to  Homer.  Plato  calls  her  the  Tenth  Muse. 
Although  her  fame  endures,  her  poetry,  except  some  mere  frag- 
ments, has  perished. 

Anacreon  was  a  courtier  at  the  time  of  the  Greek  tyrannies. 
He  was  a  native  of  Ionia,  but  passed  much  of  his  time  at  the  court 
of  Polycrates  of  Samos.  He  seems  to  have  enjoyed  to  the  full 
the  gay  and  easy  life  of  a  courtier,  and  sung  so  voluptuously  of  love 
and  wine  and  festivity  that  the  term  "Anacreontic"  has  come  to 
be  used  to  characterize  all  poetry  over-redolent  of  these  themes. 

But  the  greatest  of  the  Greek  lyric  poets,  and  perhaps  the 
greatest  of  all  lyric  poets  of  every  age  and  race,  was  Pindar  (about 
522-443  B.C.).  He  was  born  at  Thebes,  but  spent  most  of  his 
time  in  the  cities  of  Magna  Graecia.  Such  was  the  reverence  in 
which  his  memory  was  held  that  when  Alexander,  one  hundred 
years  after  Pindar's  time,  levelled  the  city  of  Thebes  to  the  ground 
on  account  of  a  revolt,  the  house  of  the  poet  was  spared,  and  left 
standing  amid  the  general  ruin  (see  p.  161) .  The  greater  number 
of  Pindar's  poems  were  inspired  by  the  scenes  of  the  national  festi- 
vals. They  describe  in  lofty  strains  the  splendors  of  the  Olympian 
chariot-races,  or  the  glory  of  the  victors  at  the  Isthmian,  the 
Nemean,  or  the  Pythian  games. 

Pindar  insists  strenuously  upon  virtue  and  self-culture.  With 
deep  meaning  he  says,  "  Become  that  which  thou  art ; "  that  is, 
be  that  which  you  are  made  to  be. 


THE   GREEK  DRAMA. 


193 


2.   The  Drama  and  Dramatists. 

Origin  of  the  Greek  Drama. — The  Greek  drama,  in  both  its 
branches  of  tragedy  and  comedy,  grew  out  of  the  songs  and  dances 
instituted  in  honor  of  the  god  of  wine  —  Dionysus  (the  same  as 
the  Roman  Bacchus). 

Tragedy  (goat-song,  possibly  from  the  accompanying  sacrifice 
of  a  goat)  sprang  from  the  graver  songs,  and  comedy  (village- 
song)  from  the  lighter  and  more  farcical  ones.  Gradually,  recital 
and  dialogue  were  added,  there  being  at  first  but  a  single  speaker, 
then  two,  and  finally  three,  which  last  was  the  classical  number. 
Thespis  (about  536 
B.C.)  is  said  to  have 
introduced  this  idea 
of  the  dialogue; 
hence  the  term 
"  Thespian  "  applied 
to  the  tragic  drama. 

Owing  to  its  origin, 
the  Greek  drama  al- 
ways retained  a  relig- 
ious character,  and 
further,  presented  two  distinct  features,  the  chorus  (the  songs 
and  dances)  and  the  dialogue.  At  first,  the  chorus  was  the 
all-important  part ;  but  later,  the  dialogue  became  the  more 
prominent  portion,  the  chorus,  however,  always  remaining  an 
essential  feature  of  the  performance.  Finally,  in  the  golden 
age  of  the  Attic  stage,  the  chorus  dancers  and  singers  were  care- 
fully trained,  at  great  expense,  and  the  dialogue  became  the  master- 
piece of  some  great  poet,  —  and  then  the  Greek  drama,  the  most 
splendid  creation  of  human  genius,  was  complete. 

The  Three  Great  Tragic  Poets.  —  There  are  three  great  names 
in  Greek  tragedy,  —  yEschylus,  Sophocles,  and  Euripides.  These 
dramatists  all  wrote  during  the  splendid  period  which  followed  the 
victories  of  the  Persian  war,  when  the  intellectual  life  of  all  Hellas, 


BACCHIC    PROCESSION. 


194 


GREEK  LITERATURE. 


and  especially  that  of  Athens,  was  strung  to  the  highest  tension. 
This  lent  nervous  power  and  intensity  to  almost  all  they  wrote, 
particularly  to  the  tragedies  af  ^Eschylus  and  Sophocles.  Of  the 
two  hundred  and  more  dramas  produced  by  these  poets,  only 
thirty-two  have  escaped  the  accidents  of  time. 

yEschylus  (525-456  B.C.)  knew  how  to  touch  the  hearts  of  the 
generation  that  had  won  the  victories  of  the  Persian  war ;  for  he 
had  fought  with  honor  both  at  Marathon  and  at  Salamis.  But  it 
was  on  a  very  different  arena  that  he  was  destined  to  win  his  most 
enduring  fame.  Eleven  times  did  he  carry  off  the  prize  in  tragic 
composition.    The  Athenians  called  him  the  "  Father  of  Tragedy." 

The  central  idea  of  his  dramas  is 
that  "  no  mortal  may  dare  raise  his 
heart  too  high,"  —  that  "  Zeus  tames 
excessive  lifting  up  of  heart."  Pro- 
metheus Bound  is  one  of  his  chief 
works.  Another  of  his  great  trage- 
dies is  Agamemnon,  thought  by 
some  to  be  his  masterpiece.  The 
subject  is  the  crime  of  Clytemnestra 
(see  p.  96) .  It  is  a  tragedy  crowded 
with  spirit-shaking  terrors,  and  filled 
with  more  than  human  crimes  and 
woes.  Nowhere  is  portrayed  with 
greater  power  the  awful  vengeance  with  which  the  implacable 
Nemesis  is  armed. 

Sophocles  (495-405  B.C.)  while  yet  a  youth  gained  the  prize  in 
a  poetic  contest  with  ^Eschylus.  Plutarch  says  that  ./Eschylus  was 
so  chagrined  by  his  defeat  that  he  left  Athens  and  retired  to 
Sicily.  Sophocles  now  became  the  leader  of  tragedy  at  Athens. 
In  almost  every  contest  he  carried  away  the  first  prize.  He  lived 
through  nearly  a  century,  a  century,  too,  that  comprised  the  most 
brilliant  period  of  the  life  of  Hellas.  His  dramas  were  perfect 
works  of  art.  The  leading  idea  of  his  pieces  is  the  same  as 
that  which  characterizes  those  of  ^Eschylus  ;  namely,  that  self-will 


/ESCHYLUS. 


GREEK  DRAMATISTS 


195 


and  insolent  pride  arouse  the  righteous  indignation  of  the  gods, 
and  that  no  mortal  can  contend  successfully  against  the  will  of 
Zeus. 

Euripides  (485-406  B.C.) 
was  a  more  popular  drama- 
tist than  either  ^Lschylus  or 
Sophocles.  His  fame  passed 
far  beyond  the  limits  of 
Greece.  Herodotus  asserts 
that  the  verses  of  the  poet 
were  recited  by  the  natives 
of  the  remote  country  of  Ge- 
drosia;  and  Plutarch  says 
that  the  Sicilians  were  so  fond 
of  his  lines  that  many  of  the 
Athenian  prisoners,  taken 
before  Syracuse,  bought  their 
liberty  by  teaching  their  mas- 
ters his  verses. 

Comedy:  Aristophanes. — 
Foremost  among  all  writers 
of  comedy  must  be  placed 
Aristophanes  (about  444- 
380  b.c).  He  introduces 
us  to  the  every-day  life  of 
the  least  admirable  classes 
of  Athenian  society.  Four 
of  his  most  noted  works  are 
the  Clouds,  the  Knights,  the 
Birds,  and  the  Wasps. 

In  the  comedy  of  the  Clouds,  Aristophanes  especially  ridicules 
the  Sophists,  a  school  of  philosophers  and  teachers  just  then  rising 
into  prominence  at  Athens,  of  whom  the  satirist  unfairly  makes 
Socrates  the  representative. 

The  aim  of  the  Knights  was  the  punishment  and  ruin  of  Cleon, 


SOPHOCLES. 


196 


GREEK  LITERATURE. 


whom  we  already  know  as  one  of  the  most  conceited  and  insolent 
of  the  demagogues  of  Athens. 

The  play  of  the  Birds  is  "  the  everlasting  allegory  of  foolish 
sham  and  flimsy  ambition."  It  was 
aimed  particularly  at  the  ambitious 
Sicilian  schemes  -of  Alcibiades  ;  for 
at  the  time  the  play  appeared,  the 
Athenian  army  was  before  Syracuse, 
and  elated  by  good  news  daily  ar- 
riving, the  Athenians  were  building 
the  most  gorgeous  air-castles,  and 
indulging  in  the  most  extravagant 
day-dreams  of  universal  dominion. 

In  the  Wasps,  the  poet  satirizes 
the  proceedings  in  the  Athenian  law- 
courts,  by  showing  how  the  great 
citizen-juries,  numbering  sometimes 
five  or  six  hundred,  were  befooled  by  the  demagogues.  But  Aris- 
tophanes was  something  more  than  a  master  of  mere  mirth-pro- 
voking satire  and  ridicule  :  many  of  the  choruses  of  his  pieces  are 
inexpressibly  tender  and  beautiful. 


EURIPIDES. 


HERODOTUS. 


3.    History  and  Historians. 

Poetry  is  the  first  form  of  literary  expression 
among  all  peoples.  So  we  must  not  be  sur- 
prised to  find  that  it  was  not  until  several  centu- 
ries after  the  composition  of  the  Homeric  poems 
—  that  is,  about  the  sixth  century  B.C.  —  that 
prose-writing  appeared  among  the  Greeks.  His- 
torical composition  was  then  first  cultivated.  We 
can  speak  briefly  of  only  three  historians, — 
Herodotus,  Thucydides  and  Xenophon,  — 
whose  names  were  cherished  among  the  an- 
cients, and  whose  writings  are  highly  valued 
and  carefully  studied  by  ourselves. 


HERODOTUS.  197 

Herodotus.  —  Herodotus  (about  484-402  B.C.),  born  at  Hali- 
carnassus,  in  Asia  Minor,  is  called  the  "Father  of  History."  He 
travelled  over  much  of  the  then  known  world,  visiting  Italy,  Egypt, 
and  Babylonia,  and  as  an  eye-witness  describes  with  a  never- 
failing  vivacity  and  freshness  the  wonders  of  the  different  lands 
he  had  seen.  Herodotus  lived  in  a  story-telling  age,  and  he  is  him- 
self an  inimitable  story-teller.  To  him  we  are  indebted  for  a  large 
part  of  the  tales  of  antiquity  —  stories  of  men  and  events  which  we 
never  tire  of  repeating.  He  was  over-credulous,  and  was  often 
imposed  upon  by  his  guides  in  Egypt  and  at  Babylon;  but  he 
describes  with  great  care  and  accuracy  what  he  himself  saw.  It  is 
sometimes  very  difficult,  however,  to  determine  just  what  he  actu- 
ally did  see  with  his  own  eyes  and  experience  in  his  own  person  ; 
for  it  seems  certain  that,  following  the  custom  of  the  story-tellers 
of  his  time,  he  often  related  as  his  own  personal  adventures  the 
experiences  of  others,  yet  with  no  thought  of  deceiving.  In  this 
he  might  be  likened  to  our  modern  writers  of  historical  romances. 

The  central  theme  of  his  great  History  is  the  Persian  wars,  the 
struggle  between  Asia  and  Greece.  Around  this  he  groups  the 
several  stories  of  the  nations  of  antiquity.  In  the  pictures  which 
the  artist-historian  draws,  we  see  vividly  contrasted,  as  in  no  other 
writings,  the  East  and  the  West,  Persia  and  Hellas. 

Thucydides.  — Thucydides  (about  471-400  B.C.), 
though  not  so  popular  an  historian  as  Herodo- 
tus, was  a  much  more  philosophical  one.  He 
was  born  near  Athens.  A  pretty  story  is  told  of 
his  youth,  which  must  be  repeated,  though  critics 
have  pronounced  it  fabulous.  The  tale  is  that 
Thucydides,  when  only  fifteen,  was  taken  by  his 
father  to  hear  Herodotus  recite  his  history  at  the 
Olympian  games,  and  that  the  reading  and  the 
accompanying   applause   caused   the  boy  to  shed 

/~  .  .  ,  .    ' .  THUCYDIDES. 

tears,  and  to  resolve  to  become  an  historian. 

Thucydides  was  engaged  in    military   service  during  the  first 

I  years  of  the  Peloponnesian  War ;  but,  on  account  of  his  being 


198  GREEK  LITERATURE. 

unfortunate,  possibly  through  his  own  neglect,  the  Athenians  de- 
prived him  of  his  command,  and  he  went  into  an  exile  of  twenty 
years.  It  is  to  this  circumstance  that  we  are  indebted  for  his  inval- 
uable History  of  the  War  between  the  Peloponnesians  and  the 
Athenians. 

Through  the  closest  observation  and  study,  hq,  qualified  himself 
to  become  the  historian  of  what  he  from  the  first  foresaw  would 
prove  a  memorable  war.  "  I  lived,"  he  says,  "  through  its  whole 
extent,  in  the  very  flower  of  my  understanding  and  strength,  and 
with  a  close  application  of  my  thoughts,  to  gain  an  exact  insight 
into  all  its  occurrences."  He  died  before  his  task  was  completed. 
The  work  is  considered  a  model  of  historical  writing.  Demos- 
thenes read  and  re-read  his  writings  to  improve  his  own  style ; 
and  the  greatest  orators  and  historians  of  modern  times  have  been 
equally  diligent  students  of  the  work  of  the  great  Athenian. 

Xenophon.  —  Xenophon  (about  445-355  b.c.)  was  an  Athe- 
nian, and  is  known  both  as  a  general  and  a  writer.  The  works  that 
render  his  name  so  familiar  are  his  Anabasis,  a  simple  yet  thrilling 
narrative  of  the  Expedition  of  the  Ten  Thousand  Greeks  ;  and  his 
Memorabilia,  or  Recollections  of  Socrates.  This  work  by  his 
devoted  pupil  is  the  most  faithful  portraiture  that  we  possess  of 
that  philosopher. 

4.  Oratory. 

Influence  of  the  Public  Assembly.  —  The  art  of  oratory  among 
the  Greeks  was  fostered  and  developed  by  the  democratic  char- 
acter of  their  institutions.  The  public  assemblies  of  the  demo- 
cratic cities  were  great  debating  clubs,  open  to  all.  The  gift  of 
eloquence  secured  for  its  possessor  a  sure  pre-eminence.  The 
law-courts,  too,  especially  the  great  jury-courts  of  Athens,  were 
schools  of  oratory ;  for  every  citizen  was  obliged  to  be  his  own 
advocate  and  to  defend  his  own  case.  Hence  the  attention  be- 
stowed upon  public  speaking,  and  the  high  degree  of  perfection 
attained  by  the  Greeks  in  the  difficult  art  of  persuasion.  Almost 
all  the  prominent  Athenian  statesmen  were  masters  of  oratory. 


THEMISTOCLES  AND  PERICLES. 


199 


Themistocles  and  Pericles.  —  We  have  already  become  ac- 
quainted with  Themistocles  and  Pericles  as  statesmen  and  leaders 
of  Athenian  affairs  during  the  most  stirring  period  of  the  history  of 
Athens.  They  both  were  also  great  orators,  and  to  that  fact  were 
largely  indebted  for  their  power 
and  influence.  Thucydides  has 
preserved  the  oration  delivered 
by  Pericles  in  commemoration  of 
those  who  fell  in  the  first  year  of 
the  Peloponnesian  War.  It  is 
an  incomparable  picture  of  the 
beauty  and  glory  of  Athens  at  the 
zenith  of  her  power,  and  has  been 
pronounced  one  of  the  finest  pro- 
ductions of  antiquity.  The  lan- 
guage of  the  address,  as  we  have 
it,  is  the  historian's,  but  the  sen- 
timents are  doubtless  those  of  the 
great  statesman.  It  was  the  habit 
of  Thucydides  to  put  speeches 
into  the  mouths  of  his  characters. 

Demosthenes  and  iEschines.  — 
It  has  been  the  fortune  of  Demos- 
thenes  (385-322  b.c.)  to  have 
his  name  become  throughout  the 
world  the  synonym  of  eloquence. 
The  labors  and  struggles  by 
which,  according  to  tradition,  he 
achieved  excellence  in  his  art  I 
are  held  up  anew  to  each  genera- 
tion of  youth   as   guides   of  the 

path  to  success.  His  first  address  before  the  public  assembly  was 
a  complete  failure,  owing  to  defects  of  voice  and  manner.  With 
indomitable  will  he  set  himself  to  the  task  of  correcting  these. 
He  shut  himself  up  in  a  cave,  and  gave  himself  to  the  diligent 


DEMOSTHENES. 


200  GREEK  LITERATURE. 

study  of  Thucydides.  That  he  might  not  be  tempted  to  spend 
his  time  in  society,  he  rendered  his  appearance  ridiculous  by  shav- 
ing one  side  of  his  head.  To  correct  a  stammering  utterance,  he 
spoke  with  pebbles  in  his  mouth,  and  broke  himself  of  an  un- 
gainly habit  of  shrugging  his  shoulders  by  speaking  beneath  a 
suspended  sword.  To  accustom  himself  to  the.,  tumult  and  inter- 
ruptions of  a  public  assembly,  he  declaimed  upon  the  noisiest  sea- 
shore. 

These  are  some  of  the  many  stories  told  of  the  world's  greatest 
orator.  There  is  doubtless  this  much  truth  in  them  at  least  — 
that  Demosthenes  attained  success,  in  spite  of  great  discourage- 
ments, by  persevering  and  laborious  effort.  It  is  certain  that  he 
was  a  most  diligent  student  of  Thucydides,  whose  great  history 
he  is  said  to  have  known  by  heart.  More  than  sixty  of  his  ora- 
tions have  been  preserved.  "  Of  all  human  productions  they 
present  to  us  the  models  which  approach  the  nearest  to  per- 
fection." 

The  latter  part  of  the  life  of  Demosthenes  is  intertwined  with 
that  of  another  and  rival  Athenian  orator,  ^Eschines.  For  his 
services  to  the  state,  the  Athenians  proposed  to  award  to  Demos- 
thenes a  golden  crown.  ^Eschines  opposed  this.  All  Athens  and 
strangers  from  far  and  near  gathered  to  hear  the  rival  orators ;  for 
every  matter  at  Athens  was  decided  by  a  great  debate.  Demos- 
thenes made  the  grandest  effort  of  his  life.  His  address,  known 
as  the  "  Oration  on  the  Crown,"  has  been  declared  to  be  "  the 
most  polished  and  powerful  effort  of  human  oratory."  ^Eschines 
was  completely  crushed,  and  was  sent  into  exile,  and  became  a 
teacher  of  oratory  at  Rhodes. 

He  is  said  to  have  once  gathered  his  disciples  about  him  and  to 
have  read  to  them  the  oration  of  Demosthenes  that  had  proved  so 
fatal  to  himself.  Carried  away  by  the  torrent  of  its  eloquence,  his 
pupils,  unable  to  restrain  their  enthusiasm,  burst  into  applause. 
"  Ah  ! "  said  JEschines,  who  seemed  to  find  solace  in  the  fact  that 
his  defeat  had  been  at  the  hands  of  so  worthy  an  antagonist,  "  you 
should  have  heard  the  wild  beast  himself  roaring  it  out !  " 


THE  ALEXANDRIAN  AGE. 


201 


Respecting  the  orations  of  Demosthenes  against  Philip  of  Mace- 
don,  and  the  death  of  the  eloquent  patriot,  we  have  already  spoken 
(see  pp.  1 60,  174). 

5.  The  Alexandrian  Age. 

The  Alexandrian  period  of  Greek  literature  embraces  the  time 
between  the  break-up  of  Alexander's  empire  and  the  conquest 
of  Greece  by  Rome  (300-146 
B.C.).  During  this  period  Al- 
exandria in  Egypt  was  the  cen- 
tre of  literary  activity,  hence  the 
term  Alexandrian,  applied  to 
the  literature  of  the  age.  The 
great  Museum  and  Library  of 
the  Ptolemies  afforded  in  that 
capital  such  facilities  for  stu- 
dents and  authors  as  existed  in 
no  other  city  in  the  world. 

But  the  creative  age  of  Greek 
literature  was  over.  With  the 
loss  of  political  liberty,  litera- 
ture was  cut  off  from  its  sources 
of  inspiration.  Consequently 
the  Alexandrian  literature 
lacked  freshness  and  original- 
ity. The  writers  of  the  period 
were  grammarians,  commenta- 
tors, and  translators,  —  in  a 
word,  book-worms. 

One  of  the  most  important  literary  undertakings  of  the  age  was 
the  translation  of  the  Old  Testament  into  Greek.  From  the  tra- 
ditional number  of  translators  (seventy)  the  version  is  known  as 
the  Septuagint  (Latin  for  seventy.)  The  work  was  probably  be- 
gun by  Ptolemy  Philadelphus,  and  was  completed  under  his  suc- 
cessors. 


Illlll 

!'"<;;     .  iff  % 

'"Hi' 

I 

iii  '      8 

|             -        1 

1 

^m  !/!l    '  VT^  jt^ 

4    J 

IDEAL   SCENE   IN   THE  ALEXANDRIAN 
LIBRARY. 


202  GREEK  LITERATURE. 

Among  the  poets  of  the  period  one  name,  and  only  one,  stands 
out  clear  and  pre-eminent.  This  is  that  of  Theocritus,  a  Sicilian 
idyllist,  who  wrote  at  Alexandria  under  Ptolemy  Philadelphus. 
His  idyls  are  beautiful  pictures  of  Sicilian  pastoral  life. 

Conclusion :  Grseco-Roman  writers.  —  After  the  Roman  con- 
quest of  Greece,  the  centre  of  Greek  literary  activity  shifted  from 
Alexandria  to  Rome.  Hence  Greek  literature  now  passes  into 
what  is  known  as  its  Graeco-Roman  period  (146  B.c-527  a.d.). 

The  most  noted  historical  writer  of  the  first  part  of  this  period 
was  Polybius  (about  203-121  B.C.),  who  wrote  a  history  of  the 
Roman  conquests  from  264  to  146  B.C.  His  work,  though  the 
larger  part  of  it  has  reached  us  in  a  very  mutilated  state,  is  of 
great  worth  ;  for  Polybius  wrote  of  matters  that  had  become  his- 
tory in  his  own  day.  He  had  lived  to  see  the  larger  part  of  the 
world  he  knew  absorbed  by  the  ever-growing  power  of  the  Imperial 
City. 

Plutarch  (b.  about  40  a.d.),  "  the  prince  of  ancient  biogra- 
phers," will  always  live  in  literature  as  the  author  of  the  Parallel 
Lives,  in  which,  with  great  wealth  of  illustrative  anecdotes,  he  com- 
pares or  contrasts  Greek  and  Roman  statesmen  and  soldiers. 


THE  SEVEN  SAGES.  203 


CHAPTER   XX. 

GREEK   PHILOSOPHY  AND   SCIENCE. 

The  Seven  Sages ;  the  Forerunners.  — About  the  sixth  centun 
B.C.  there  lived  and  taught  in  different  parts  of  Hellas  many  phi- 
losophers of  real  or  reputed  originality  and  wisdom.  Among  these 
were  seven  men,  called  the  "  Seven  Sages,"  who  held  the  place  of 
pre-eminence.1  To  them  belongs  the  distinction  of  having  first 
aroused  the  Greek  intellect  to  philosophical  thought.  The  wise 
sayings  —  such  as  "Know  thyself"  and  "  Nothing  in  excess  "  — 
attributed  to  them,  are  beyond  number. 

The  ethical  maxims  and  practical  proverbs  ascribed  to  the 
sages,  while,  like  the  so-called  proverbs  of  Solomon,  they  con- 
tain a  vast  amount  of  practical  wisdom,  still  do  not  constitute 
philosophy  proper,  which  is  a  systematic  search  for  the  reason 
and  causes  of  things.  They  form  simply  the  introduction  or 
prelude  to  Greek  philosophy. 

The  Ionic  Philosophers.  — The  first  Greek  school  of  philosophy 
grew  up  in  the  cities  of  Ionia,  in  Asia  Minor,  where  almost  all 
forms  of  Hellenic  culture  seem  to  have  had  their  beginning.  The 
founder  of  the  system  wasThales  of  Miletus  (about  640-550  B.C.), 
who  was  followed  by  Anaximander,  Anaximenes,  and  Heraclitus. 

One  tenet  held  in  common  by  all  these  philosophers  was  that 
matter  and  mind  are  inseparable ;  or,  in  other  words,  that  all 
matter  is  animate.  They  never  thought  of  the  soul  as  something 
distinct  and  separable  from  matter  as  we  do.     Even  the  soul  in 

1  As  in  the  case  of  the  Seven  Wonders  of  the  World,  ancient  writers  were 
not  always  agreed  as  to  what  names  should  be  accorded  the  honor  of  enrol- 
ment in  the  sacred  number.  Thales,  Solon,  Periander,  Cleobulus,  Chilo,  P.i:is, 
and  l'ittacus  are,  however,  usually  reckoned  as  the  Seven  Wise  Men. 


204  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND  SCIENCE. 

Hades  was  conceived  as  having  a  body  in  every  respect  like  that 
the  soul  possessed  in  the  earthly  life,  only  it  was  composed  of  a 
subtler  substance.  This  conception  of  matter  as  being  alive  will 
help  us  to  understand  Greek  mythology,  which,  it  will  be  remem- 
bered, endowed  trees,  rivers,  springs,  clouds,  the  planets,  all  phys- 
ical objects  indeed,  with  intelligence  and  will.    * 

Pythagoras.  —  Pythagoras  (about  580-500  B.C.)  was  born  on 
the  island  of  Samos,  whence  his  title  of  "  Samian  Sage."  Probable 
tradition  says  that  he  spent  many  years  of  his  early  life  in  Egypt, 
where  he  became  versed  in  all  the  mysteries  of  the  Egyptians.  He 
returned  to  Greece  with  a  great  reputation,  and  finally  settled  at 
Crotona,  in  Italy. 

Like  many  another  ancient  philosopher,  Pythagoras  sought  to 
increase  the  reverence  of  his  disciples  for  himself  by  peculiarities 
of  dress  and  manner.  His  uncut  hair  and  beard  flowed  down 
upon  his  shoulders  and  over  his  breast.  He  never  smiled.  His 
dress  was  a  white  robe,  with  a  golden  crown.  For  the  first  years 
of  their  novitiate,  his  pupils  were  not  allowed  to  look  upon  their 
master.  They  listened  to  his  lectures  from  behind  a  curtain. 
Ipse  dixit,  "  he  himself  said  so,"  was  the  only  argument  they  must 
employ  in  debate.  It  is  to  Pythagoras,  according  to  legend,  that 
we  are  indebted  for  the  word  philosopher.  Being  asked  of  what 
he  was  master,  he  replied  that  he  was  simply  a  "philosopher," 
that  is,  a  "  lover  of  wisdom." 

Pythagoras  held  views  of  the  solar  system  that  anticipated  by 
two  thousand  years  those  of  Copernicus  and  his  school.  He 
taught,  only  to  his  most  select  pupils  however,  that  the  earth  is  a 
sphere ;  and  that,  like  the  other  planets,  it  revolves  about  a  cen- 
tral globe  of  fire.  From  him  comes  the  pretty  conceit  of  the 
"  music  of  the  spheres."  He  imagined  that  the  heavenly  spheres, 
by  their  swift,  rolling  motions,  produced  musical  notes,  which 
united  in  a  celestial  melody,  too  refined,  however,  for  human 
ears. 

He  taught  the  doctrine  of  the  transmigration  of  souls,  an  idea 
he  had  doubtless  brought  from  Egypt.     Because  of  this  belief  the 


ANAXAGORAS.  205 

Pythagoreans  were  strict  vegetarians,  abstaining  religiously  from 
the  use  of  all  animal  food. 

Anaxagoras.  —  Anaxagoras  (499-427  B.C.)  was  the  first  Greek 
philosopher  who  made  mifid,  instead  of  necessity  or  chance,  the 
arranging  and  harmonizing  force  of  the  universe.  "  Reason  rules 
the  world  "  was  his  first  maxim. 

Anaxagoras  was  the  teacher  in  philosophy  of  Pericles,  and  it  is 
certain  that  that  statesman  was  greatly  influenced  by  the  liberal 
views  of  the  philosopher  j  for  in  his  general  conceptions  of  the 
universe,  Anaxagoras  was  far  in  advance  of  his  age.  He  ventured 
to  believe  that  the  moon  was  somewhat  like  the  earth,  and  in- 
habited ;  and  taught  that  the  sun  was  not  a  god,  but  a  glowing 
rock,  as  large,  probably,  as  the  Peloponnesus. 

But  for  his  audacity,  the  philosopher  suffered  the  fate  of  Galileo 
in  a  later  age  ;  he  was  charged  with  impiety  and  exiled.  Yet  this 
did  not  disturb  the  serenity  of  his  mind.  In  banishment  he  said, 
"  It  is  not  I  who  have  lost  the  Athenians,  but  the  Athenians  who 
have  lost  me." 

Empedocles  and  Democritus.  —  In  the  teachings  of  Empedocles 
(about  492-432  b.c.)  and  Democritus  (about  460-370  B.C.)  we 
meet  with  many  speculations  respecting  the  constitution  of  matter 
and  the  origin  of  things  which  are  startlingly  similar  to  some  of 
the  doctrines  held  by  modern  scientists.  Empedocles,  with  the 
evolutionists  of  to-day,  taught  that  the  higher  forms  of  life  arise 
out  of  the  lower;  Democritus  conceived  all  things  to  be  com- 
posed of  invisible  atoms,  all  alike  in  quality,  but  differing  in  form 
and  combination. 

The  Sophists.  — The  Sophists,  of  whom  the  most  noted  were 
I'rotagoras,  Gorgias,  and  Prodicus,  were  a  class  of  philosophers  or 
teachers  who  gave  instruction  in  rhetoric  and  the  art  of  disputa- 
tion. They  travelled  about  from  city  to  city,  and  contrary  to  the 
usual  custom  of  the  Greek  philosophers,  took  fees  from  their 
pupils.  They  were  shallow  but  brilliant  men,  caring  more  for  the 
dress  in  which  the  thought  was  arrayed  than  for  the  thought  itself, 
more  for  victory  than  for  truth ;  and  some  of  them  inculcated  a 


206  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND  SCIENCE. 

selfish  morality.  The  better  philosophers  of  the  time  despised 
them,  and  applied  to  them  many  harsh  epithets,  taunting  them 
with  selling  wisdom,  and  accusing  them  of  boasting  that  they 
could  "make  the  worse  appear  the  better  reason." 

Socrates. — Volumes  would  not  contain  what  would  be  both 
instructive  and  interesting  respecting  the  lives  ^and  works  of  the 
three  great  philosophers  Socrates,  Plato,  and  Aristotle.  We  can, 
however,  accord  to  each  only  a  few  words.  Of  these  three  emi- 
nent thinkers,  Socrates  (469-399  B.C.),  though  surpassed  in  grasp 
and  power  of  intellect  by  both  Plato  and 
Aristotle,  has  the  firmest  hold  upon  the 
affections  of  the  world. 

Nature,  while  generous  to  the  philos- 
opher in  the  gifts  of  soul,  was  unkind  to 
him  in  the  matter  of  his  person.  His 
face  was  ugly  as  a  satyr's,  and  he  had 
an  awkward,  shambling  walk,  so  that  he 
invited  the  shafts  of  the  comic  poets 
of  his  time.  He  loved  to  gather  a  little 
circle  about  him  in  the  Agora  or  in  the 
streets,  and  then  to  draw  out  his  listen- 
ers by  a  series  of  ingenious  questions. 
socrates.  jj-s   methoci  was  s0  peculiar  to  himself 

that  it  has  received  the  designation  of  the  "  Socratic  dialogue." 
He  has  very  happily  been  called  an  educator,  as  opposed  to  an 
instructor.  In  the  young  men  of  his  time  Socrates  found  many 
devoted  pupils.  The  youthful  Alcibiades  declared  that  "  he  was 
forced  to  stop  his  ears  and  flee  away,  that  he  might  not  sit  down 
by  the  side  of  Socrates  and  grow  old  in  listening." 

Socrates  was  unfortunate  in  his  domestic  relations.  Xanthippe, 
his  wife,  seems  to  have  been  of  a  practical  turn  of  mind,  and  un- 
able to  sympathize  with  the  abstracted  ways  of  her  husband. 

This  great  philosopher  believed  that  the  proper  study  of  man- 
kind is  man,  his  favorite  maxim  being  "  Know  Thyself";  hence 


PLA  TO. 


1W 


he  is  said  to  have  brought  philosophy  from  the  heavens  and  intro- 
duced it  to  the  homes  of  men. 

Socrates  held  the  Sophists  in  aversion,  and  in  opposition  to  their 
selfish  expediency  taught  the  purest  system  of  morals  that  the 
world  had  yet  known,  and  which  has  been  surpassed  only  by  the 
precepts  of  the  Great  Teacher.  He  thought  himself  to  be  re- 
strained from  entering  upon  what  was  inexpedient  or  wrong 
by  a  tutelary  spirit.  He  believed  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul 
and  in  a  Supreme  Ruler  of  the  universe,  but  sometimes  spoke 
slightingly  of  the  temples  and  the  popular  deities.  This  led  to  his 
prosecution  on  the  double  charge  of  blasphemy  and  of  corrupting 
the  Athenian  youth.  The  fact  that  Alcibiades  had  been  his  pupil 
was  used  to  prove  the  demoralizing  tendency  of  his  teachings. 
He  was  condemned  to  drink  the  fatal  hemlock.  The  night  before 
his  death  he  spent  with  his  disciples,  discoursing  on  the  immor- 
tality of  the  soul. 

Plato.  —  Plato  (429-348  B.C.),  "  the  broad-browed,"  was  a  phi- 
losopher of  noble  birth,  before  whom  in  youth  a  brilliant  career 
in  the  world  of  Greek  affairs  opened ;  but,  coming  under  the  influ- 
ence of  Socrates,  he  resolved  to  give  up 
all  his  prospects  in  politics  and  devote 
himself  to  philosophy.  Upon  the  con- 
demnation and  death  of  his  master  he 
went  into  voluntary  exile.  In  many  lands 
he  gathered  knowledge  and  met  with 
varied  experiences.  He  visited  Sicily, 
where  he  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  call 
upon  himself  the  resentment  of  Diony- 
sius,  tyrant  of  Syracuse,  through  having 
worsted  him  in  an  argument,  and  also  by 
an  uncourtly  plainness  of  speech.  The 
king  caused  him  to  be  sold  into  slavery 

I  as  a  prisoner  of  war.  Being  ransomed  by  a  friend,  he  found  his 
way  to  his  native  Athens,  and  established  a  school  of  philosophy  in 
the  Academy,  a  public  garden  close  to  Athens.     Here  amid  the  dis- 


PLATO. 


208  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND  SCIENCE. 

ciples  that  thronged  to  his  lectures,  he  passed  the  greater  part 
of  his  long  life,  —  he  died  348  B.C.,  at  the  age  of  eighty-one  years, 
—  laboring  incessantly  upon  the  great  works  that  bear  his  name. 

Plato  imitated  in  his  writings  the  method  of  Socrates  in  conversa- 
tion. The  discourse  is  carried  on  by  questions  and  answers,  hence 
the  term  Dialogues  that  attaches  to  his  works.  IJe  attributes  to  his 
master,  Socrates,  much  of  the  philosophy  that  he  teaches  :  yet 
his  Dialogues  are  all  deeply  tinged  with  his  own  genius  and 
thought.  In  the  Republic  Plato  portrays  his  conception  of  an 
ideal  state.  He  was  opposed  to  the  republic  of  Athens,  and  his 
system,  in  some  of  its  main  features,  was  singularly  like  the  Feudal 
System  of  mediaeval  Europe. 

The  Phado  is  a  record  of  the  last  conversation  of  Socrates  with 
his  disciples  —  an  immortal  argument  for  the  immortality  of  the 
soul. 

Plato  believed  not  only  in  a  future  life  (post-existence),  but  also 
in  pre-existence ;  teaching  that  the  ideas  of  reason,  or  our  intu- 
itions, are  reminiscences  of  a  past  experience.1  Plato's  doctrines 
have  exerted  a  profound  influence  upon  all  schools  of  thought  and 
philosophies  since  his  day.  In  some  of  his  precepts  he  made  a 
close  approach  to  the  teachings  of  Christianity.  "  We  ought  to 
become  like  God,"  he  said,  "  as  far  as  this  is  possible ;  and  to 
become  like  Him  is  to  become  holy  and  just  and  wise." 

Aristotle.  —  As  Socrates  was  surpassed  by  his  pupil  Plato,  so  in 
turn  was  Plato  excelled  in  certain  respects  by  his  disciple  Aristotle, 
"  the  master  of  those  who  know."  In  him  the  philosophical  genius 
of  the  Hellenic  intellect  reached  its  culmination.    He  was  born  in  the 

1  In  the  following  lines  from  Wordsworth  we  catch  a  glimpse  of  Plato's 
doctrine  of  pre-existence  :  — 

"  Our  birth  is  but  a  sleep  and  a  forgetting; 
The  soul  that  rises  with  us,  our  life's  star, 
Hath  had  elsewhere  its  setting, 

And  cometh  from  afar: 
Not  in  entire  forgetfulness, 
Nor  yet  in  utter  nakedness, 
But  trailing  clouds  of  glory,  do  we  come 
From  God,  who  is  our  home." —  Ode  on  Immortality. 


ARISTOTLE. 


209 


Macedonian  city  of  Stagira  (384  B.C.),  and  hence  is  frequently 
called  the  "  Stagirite."  As  in  the  case  of  Socrates,  his  personal 
appearance  gave  no  promise  of  the  philosopher.  His  teacher, 
Plato,  however,  recognized  the  gen- 
ius of  his  pupil,  and  called  him  the 
"  Mind  of  the  school." 

After  studying  for  twenty  years  in 
the  school  of  Plato,  Aristotle  became 
the  preceptor  of  Alexander  the 
Great.  When  Philip  invited  him 
to  become  the  tutor  of  his  son,  he 
gracefully  complimented  the  philos- 
opher by  saying  in  his  letter  that  he 
was  grateful  to  the  gods  that  the 
prince  was  born  in  the  same  age 
with  him.  Alexander  became  the 
liberal  patron  of  his  tutor,  and  aided 
him  in  his  scientific  studies  by  send- 
ing him  large  collections  of  plants 
and  animals,  gathered  on  his  distant 
expeditions. 

At  Athens  'the  great  philosopher 
delivered  his  lectures  while  walking 
about  beneath  the  trees  and  por- 
ticoes of  the  Lyceum ;  hence  the 
term  peripatetic  (from  the  Greek 
peripatein,  "  to  walk  about")  applied 
to  his  philosophy. 

Among  the  productions  of  his  fertile  intellect  are  works  on 
rhetoric,  logic,  poetry,  morals  and  politics,  physics  and  meta- 
physics. For  centuries  his  works  were  studied  and  copied  and 
commented  upon  by  both  European  and  Asiatic  scholars,  in  the 
schools  of  Athens  and  Rome,  of  Alexandria  and  Constantinople. 
Until  the  time  of  Bacon  in  Kngland,  for  nearly  two  thousand  years, 
Aristotle  ruled  over  the  realm  of  mind  with  a  despotic  sway.     All 


ARISTOTLE. 


210  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND   SCIENCE. 

teachers  and  philosophers  acknowledged  him  as  their  guide  and 
master. 

Zeno  and  the  Stoics.  — We  are  now  approaching  the  period 
when  the  political  life  of  Hellas  was  failing,  and  was  being  fast 
overshadowed  by  the  greatness  of  Rome.  But  the  intellectual  life 
of  the  Greek  race  was  by  no  means  eclipsed  by,  the  calamity  that 
ended  its  political  existence.  For  centuries  after  that  event  the 
poets,  scholars,  and  philosophers  of  this  intellectual  people  led  a 
brilliant  career  in  the  schools  and  universities  of  the  Roman 
world. 

From  among  all  the  philosophers  of  this  long  period,  we  can 
select  for  brief  mention  only  a  few.  And  first  we  shall  speak  of 
Zeno  and  Epicurus,  who  are  noted  as  founders  of  schools  of  phi- 
losophy that  exerted  a  vast  influence  upon  both  the  thought  and 
the  conduct  of  many  centuries. 

Zeno,  founder  of  the  celebrated  school  of  the  Stoics,  lived  in 
the  third  century  before  our  era  (about  362-264).  He  taught  at 
Athens  in  a  public  porch  (in  Greek,  stoa),  from  which  circumstance 
comes  the  name  applied  to  his  disciples. 

The  Stoical  philosophy  was  the  outgrowth,  in  part  at  least,  of 
that  of  the  Cynics,  a  sect  of  most  rigid  and  austere  morals.  The 
typical  representative  of  this  sect  is  found  in  Diogenes,  who  lived, 
so  the  story  goes,  in  a  tub,  and  went  about  Athens  by  daylight 
with  a  lantern,  in  search,  as  he  said,  of  a  man.  The  Cynics  were 
simply  a  race  of  pagan  hermits. 

The  Stoics  inculcated  virtue  for  the  sake  of  itself.  They  be- 
lieved —  and  it  would  be  very  difficult  to  frame  a  better  creed  — 
that  "  man's  chief  business  here  is  to  do  his  duty."  They  schooled 
themselves  to  bear  with  perfect  composure  any  lot  that  destiny 
might  appoint.  Any  sign  of  emotion  on  account  of  calamity  was 
considered  unmanly  and  unphilosophical.  Thus,  when  told  of  the 
sudden  death  of  his  son,  the  Stoic  replied,  "  Well,  I  never  imagined 
that  I  had  given  life  to  an  immortal." 

Stoicism  became  a  favorite  system  of  thought  with  certain  classes 
of  the  Romans,  and  under  its  teachings  and  doctrines  were  nour- 


EPICURUS  AND    THE  EPICUREANS.  211 

ished  some  of  the  purest  and  loftiest  characters  produced  by  the 
pagan  world.  It  numbered  among  its  representatives,  in  later 
times,  the  illustrious  Roman  emperor  Marcus  Aurelius,  and  the 
scarcely  less  renowned  and  equally  virtuous  slave  Epictetus.  *In 
many  of  its  teachings  it  anticipated  Christian  doctrines,  and  was, 
in  the  philosophical  world,  a  very  important  preparation  for  Chris- 
tianity. 

Epicurus  and  the  Epicureans.  —  Epicurus  (342-270  b.c), 
who  was  a  contemporary  of  Zeno,  taught,  in  opposition  to  the 
Stoics,  that  pleasure  is  the  highest  good. 
He  recommended  virtue,  indeed,  but  only 
as  a  means  for  the  attainment  of  pleasure ; 
whereas  the  Stoics  made  virtue  an  end  in 
itself.  In  other  words,  Epicurus  said,  "  Be 
virtuous,  because  virtue  will  bring  you  the 
greatest  amount  of  happiness  "  j  Zeno  said, 
"  Be  virtuous,  because  you  ought  to  be." 

Epicurus  had  many  followers  in  Greece, 
and  his  doctrines  were  eagerly  embraced 
by  many  among  the  Romans  during  the 
corrupt    period    of    the    Roman   empire. 

r        r  EPICURUS. 

Many  of  these  disciples  carried  the  doc- 
trines of  their  master  to  an  excess  that  he  himself  would  have  been 
the  first  to  condemn.  Allowing  full  indulgence  to  every  appetite 
and  passion,  their  whole  philosophy  was  expressed  in  the  proverb, 
"  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die."  No  pure  or 
exalted  life  could  be  nourished  in  the  unwholesome  atmosphere 
of  such  a  philosophy.  Epicureanism  never  produced  a  single 
great  character. 

The  Skeptics  ;  Pyrrho.  — About  the  beginning  of  the  third  cen- 
tury b.c.  skepticism  became  widespread  in  Greece.  It  seemed  as 
though  men  were  losing  faith  in  everything.  Many  circumstances 
had  worked  together  in  bringing  about  this  state  of  universal 
unbelief.  A  wider  knowledge  of  the  world  had  caused  many  to 
their  faith  in  the  myths  and  legends  of  the  old  mythologies. 


212  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND   SCIENCE. 

The  existence  of  so  many  opposing  systems  of  philosophy  caused 
men  to  doubt  the  truth  of  any  of  them.  Many  thoughtful  minds 
were  hopelessly  asking,  "What  is  truth?" 

*Pyrrho  (about  360-270  B.C.)  was  the  doubting  Thomas  of  the 
Greeks.  He  questioned  everything,  and  declared  that  the  great 
problems  of  the  universe  could  not  be  solved.  -  He  asserted  that 
it  was  the  duty  of  man,  and  the  part  of  wisdom,  to  entertain  no 
positive  judgment  on  any  matter,  and  thus  to  ensure  serenity  and 
peace  of  mind. 

The  disciples  of  Pyrrho  went  to  absurd  lengths  in  their  skepti- 
cism, some  of  them  even  saying  that  they  asserted  nothing,  not 
even  that  they  asserted  nothing.  They  doubted  whether  they 
doubted. 

The  Neo-Platonists.  —  Neo-Platonism  was  a  blending  of  Greek 
philosophy  and  Oriental  mysticism.  It  has  been  well  called  the 
"despair  of  reason,"  because  it  abandoned  all  hope  of  man's  ever 
being  able  to  attain  the  highest  knowledge  through  reason  alone, 
and  looked  for  a  Revelation.  The  centre  of  this  last  movement  in 
Greek  philosophical  thought  was  Alexandria  in  Egypt,  the  meet- 
ing-place, in  the  closing  centuries  of  the  ancient  world,  of  the  East 
and  the  West. 

Philo  the  Jew  (b.  about  30  B.C.),  who  labored  to  harmonize 
Hebrew  doctrines  with  the  teachings  of  Plato,  was  the  forerunner 
of  the  Neo-Platonists.  But  the  greatest  of  the  school  was  Ploti- 
nus  (a.d.  204-269),  who  spent  the  last  years  of  his  life  at  Rome, 
where  he  was  a  great  favorite. 

Conflict  between  Neo-Platonism  and  Christianity.  —  While 
the  Neo-Platonists  were  laboring  to  restore,  in  modified  form,  the 
ancient  Greek  philosophy  and  worship,  the  teachers  of  Christi- 
anity were  fast  winning  the  world  over  to  a  new  faith.  The  two 
systems  came  into  deadly  antagonism.  Christianity  triumphed. 
The  gifted  and  beautiful  Hypatia.  almost  the  last  representative  of 
the  old  system  of  speculation  and  belief,  was  torn  to  pieces  in  the 
streets  of  Alexandria  by  a  mob  of  fanatic  Christian  monks  (a.d. 
415).     Finally  the  Roman  emperor  Justinian  forbade  the  pagan 


SCIENCE  AMONG    THE   GREEKS.  213 

philosophers  to  teach  their  doctrines  (a.d.  529).  This  imperial 
edict  closed  forever  the  Greek  schools,  in  which  for  more  than  a 
thousand  years  the  world  had  received  instruction  upon  the  loftiest 
themes  that  can  engage  the  human  mind.  The  Greek  philoso- 
phers, as  living,  personal  teachers,  had  finished  their  work ;  but 
their  systems  of  thought  will  never  cease  to  attract  and  influence 
the  best  minds  of  the  race. 

Science  among  the  Greeks. 

The  contributions  of  the  Greek  observers  to  the  physical  sciences 
have  laid  us  under  no  small  obligation  to  them.  Some  of  those 
whom  we  have  classed  as  philosophers,  were  careful  students  of 
nature,  and  might  be  called  scientists.  The  great  philosopher 
Aristotle  wrote  some  valuable  works  on  anatomy  and  natural  his- 
tory. From  his  time  onward  the  sciences  were  pursued  with  much 
zeal  and  success.  Especially  did  the  later  Greeks  do  much  good 
and  lasting  work  in  the  mathematical  sciences. 

Mathematics :  Euclid  and  Archimedes.  — Alexandria,  in  Egypt, 
became  the  seat  of  the  most  celebrated  school  of  mathematics  of 
antiquity.  Here,  under  Ptolemy  Lagus,  flourished  Euclid,  the 
great  geometer,  whose  work  forms  the  basis  of  the  science  of 
geometry  as  taught  in  our  schools  at  the  present  time.  Ptolemy 
himself  was  his  pupil.  The  royal  student,  however,  seems  to  have 
disliked  the  severe  application  required  to  master  the  problems  of 
Euclid,  and  asked  his  teacher  if  there  was  not  some  easier  way. 
Euclid  replied,  "There  is  no  royal  road  to  geometry." 

In  the  third  century  B.C.,  Syracuse,  in  Sicily,  was  the  home  of 
Archimedes,  the  greatest  mathematician  that  the  Grecian  world 
produced. 

Astronomy.  —  Among  ancient  Greek  astronomers,  Aristarchus, 
Hipparchus,  and  Claudius  Ptolemy  are  distinguished. 

Aristarchus  of  Samos,  who  lived  in  the  third  century  B.C.,  held 
that  the  earth  revolves  about  the  sun  as  a  fixed  centre,  and  rotates 
on  its  own  axis.  He  was  the  Greek  Copernicus.  But  his  theory 
was  rejected  by  his  contemporaries  and  successors. 


214  GREEK  PHILOSOPHY  AND   SCIENCE. 

Hipparchus,  who  flourished  about  the  middle  of  the  second 
century  B.C.,  was,  through  his  careful  observations,  the  real  founder 
of  scientific  astronomy.  He  calculated  eclipses,  catalogued  the 
stars,  and  wrote  several  astronomical  works  of  a  really  scientific 
character. 

Claudius  Ptolemy  lived  in  Egypt  about  the  middle  of  the  second 
century  after  Christ.  His  great  reputation  is  due  not  so  much  to 
his  superior  genius  as  to  the  fortunate  circumstance  that  a  vast 
work  compiled  by  him,  preserved  and  transmitted  to  later  times 
almost  all  the  knowledge  of  the  ancients  on  astronomical  and 
geographical  subjects.  In  this  way  it  has  happened  that  his  name 
has  become  attached  to  various  doctrines  and  views  respecting 
the  universe,  though  these  probably  were  not  originated  by  him. 
The  phrase  Ptolemaic  system,  however,  links  his  name  inseparably 
with  that  conception  of  the  solar  system  set  forth  in  his  works, 
which  continued  to  be  the  received  theory  from  his  time  until 
Copernicus  —  fourteen  centuries  later. 

Ptolemy  combated  the  theory  of  Aristarchus  in  regard  to  the 
rotation  and  revolution  of  the  earth  j  yet  he  believed  the  earth  to 
be  a  globe,  and  supported  this  view  by  exactly  the  same  argu- 
ments that  we  to-day  use  to  prove  the  doctrine. 


EDUCATION. 


215 


CHAPTER   XXI. 


SOCIAL  LIFE  OF  THE  GREEKS. 


Education.  —  Education  at  Sparta,  where  it  was  chiefly  gymnas- 
tic, as  we  have  seen  (p.  115),  was  a  state  affair;  but  at  Athens 
and  throughout  Greece  generally,  the  youth  were  trained  in  private 
schools.  These  schools  were  of  all  grades,  ranging  from  those 
kept  by  the  most  obscure  teachers,  who  gathered  their  pupils  in 
some  recess  of  the  street,  to  those  established  in  the  Athenian 
Academy  and  Lyceum  by  such  philosophers  as  Plato  and  Aristotle. 


A   GREEK   SCHOOL.     (After  a  vase-painting.) 


It  was  only  the  boys  who  received  education.  These  Grecian 
boys,  Professor  MahafTy  imagines,  were  "  the  most  attractive  the 
world  has  ever  seen."  At  all  events,  we  may  believe  that  they 
were  trained  more  carefully  and  delicately  than  the  youth  among 
any  other  people  before  or  since  the  days  of  Hellenic  culture. 


216  SOCIAL  LIFE    OF  THE   GREEKS. 

In  the  nursery,  the  boy  was  taught  the  beautiful  myths  and 
stories  of  the  national  mythology.  At  about  seven  he  entered 
school,  being  led  to  and  from  the  place  of  training  by  an  old  slave, 
who  bore  the  name  of  pedagogue,  which  in  Greek  means  a  guide 
or  leader  of  boys  —  not  a  teacher.  His  studies  were  grammar, 
music,  and  gymnastics,  the  aim  of  the  course  being  to  secure  a 
symmetrical  development  of  mind  and  body  alike. 

Grammar  included  reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic ;  music, 
which  embraced  a  wide  range  of  mental  accomplishments,  trained 
the  boy  to  appreciate  the  masterpieces  of  the  great  poets,  to  con- 
tribute his  part  to  the  musical  diversions  of  private  entertainments, 
and  to  join  in  the  sacred  choruses  and  in  the  paean  of  the  battle- 
field. The  exercises  of  the  palestrae  and  the  gymnasia  trained  him 
for  the  Olympic  contests,  or  for  those  sterner  hand-to-hand  battle- 
struggles,  in  which  so  much  depended  upon  personal  strength  and 
dexterity. 

Upon  reaching  maturity,  the  youth  was  enrolled  in  the  list  of  citi- 
zens. But  his  graduation  from  school  was  his  "  commencement  " 
in  a  much  more  real  sense  than  with  the  average  modern  graduate. 
Never  was  there  a  people  besides  the  Greeks  whose  daily  life  was 
so  emphatically  a  discipline  in  liberal  culture.  The  schools  of  the 
philosophers,  the  debates  of  the  popular  assembly,  the  practice  of 
the  law-courts,  the  religious  processions,  the  representations  of  an 
unrivalled  stage,  the  Panhellenic  games  —  all  these  were  splendid 
and  efficient  educational  agencies,  which  produced  and  maintained 
a  standard  of  average  intelligence  and  culture  among  the  citizens 
of  the  Greek  cities  that  probably  has  never  been  attained  among 
any  other  people  on  the  earth.  Freeman,  quoted  approvingly  by 
Mahaffy,  says  that  "the  average  intelligence  of  the  assembled 
Athenian  citizens  was  higher  than  that  of  our  [the  English]  House 
of  Commons." 

Social  Position  of  Woman.  —  Woman's  social  position  in  ancient 
Greece  may  be  defined  in  general  as  being  about  half-way  between 
Oriental  seclusion  and  Western  freedom.  Her  main  duties  were 
to  cook  and  spin,  and  to  oversee  the  domestic  slaves,  of  whom  she 


THEATRICAL   ENTERTAINMENTS.  217 

herself  was  practically  one.  In  the  fashionable  society  of  Ionian 
cities,  she  was  seldom  allowed  to  appear  in  public,  or  to  meet, 
even  in  her  own  house,  the  male  friends  of  her  husband.  In 
Sparta,  however,  and  in  Dorian  states  generally,  she  was  accorded 
much  greater  freedom,  and  was  a  really  important  factor  in  society. 

The  low  position  generally  assigned  the  wife  in  the  home  had  a 
most  disastrous  effect  upon  Greek  morals.  She  could  exert  no 
such  elevating  or  refining  influence  as  she  casts  over  the  modern 
home.  The  men  were  led  to  seek  social  and  intellectual  sym- 
pathy and  companionship  outside  the  family  circle,  among  a  class 
of  women  known  as  Hetairae,  who  were  esteemed  chiefly  for  their 
brilliancy  of  intellect.  As  the  most  noted  representative  of  this 
class  stands  Aspasia,  the  friend  of  Pericles. 
The  influence  of  the  Hetairae  was  most  harm- 
ful to  social  morality. 

Theatrical  Entertainments. — Among  the 
ancient  Greeks  the  theatre  was  a  state  estab- 
lishment, "a  part  of  the  constitution."  This 
arose  from  the  religious  origin  and  character 
of  the  drama  (see  p.  193),  all  matters  per- 
taining to  the  popular  worship  being  the 
care  and  concern  of  the  state.  Theatrical 
performances,  being  religious  acts,  were  pre- 
sented only  during  religious  festivals,  and 
were  attended  by  all  classes,  rich  and  poor, 
men,  women,  and  children.  The  women, 
however,  except  the  Hetairae,  were,  it  would 
seem,  permitted  to  witness  tragedies  only ; 
the  comic  stage  was  too  gross  to  allow  of 
their  presence.  The  spectators  sat  under 
the  open  sky ;  and  the  pieces  followed  one 
after  the  other  in  close  succession  from  early 

...      .    ,     -  ..  J     GREEK   TRAGIC    FIGURE. 

morning  till  nightfall. 

There  were  companies  of  players  who  strolled  about  the  coun- 
try, just  as  the  English  actors  of  Shakespeare's  time  were  wont  to 


218  SOCIAL   LIFE    OF   THE    GREEKS. 

do.  While  the  better  class  of  actors  were  highly  honored,  ordi- 
nary players  were  held  in  very  low  esteem.  The  tragic  actor 
increased  his  height  and  size  by  wearing  thick-soled  buskins,  an 
enormous  mask,  and  padded  garments.  The  actor  in  comedy 
wore  thin-soled  slippers,  or  socks.  The  sock  being  thus  a  charac- 
teristic part  of  the  make-up  of  the  ancient  comic  actor,  and  the 
buskin  that  of  the  tragic  actor,  these  foot  coverings  have  come  to 
be  used  as  the  symbols  respectively  of  comedy  and  tragedy,  as  in 
the  familiar  lines  of  Dryden  :  — 

"  Great  Fletcher  never  treads  in  buskins  here, 
Nor  greater  Jonson  dares  in  socks  appear." 

The  theatre  exerted  a  great  influence  upon  Greek  life.  It  per- 
formed for  ancient  Greek  society  somewhat  the  same  service  as 
that  rendered  to  modern  society  by  the  pulpit  and  the  press. 
During  the  best  days  of  Hellas  the  frequent  rehearsal  upon  the 
stage  of  the  chief  incidents  in  the  lives  of  the  gods  and  the  heroes 
served  to  deepen  and  strengthen  the  religious  faith  of  the  people  j 
and  later,  in  the  Macedonian  period,  the  theatre  was  one  of  the  chief 
agents  in  the  diffusion  of  Greek  literary  culture  over  the  world. 

Banquets  and  Symposia.  —  Banquets  and  drinking-parties 
among  the  Greeks  possessed  some  features  which  set  them  apart 
from  similar  entertainments  among  other  peoples. 

The  banquet  proper  was  partaken,  in  later  times,  by  the  guest 
in  a  reclining  position,  upon  couches  or  divans,  arranged  about 
the  table  in  the  Oriental  manner.  After  the  usual  courses,  a  liba- 
tion was  poured  out  and  a  hymn  sung  in  honor  of  the  gods,  and 
then  followed  that  characteristic  part  of  the  entertainment  known 
as  the  symposium. 

The  symposium  was  "the  intellectual  side  of  the  feast."  It 
consisted  of  general  conversation,  riddles,  and  convivial  songs  ren- 
dered to  the  accompaniment  of  the  lyre  passed  from  hand  to 
hand.  Generally,  professional  singers  and  musicians,  dancing-girls, 
jugglers,  and  jesters  were  called  in  to  contribute  to  the  merry- 
making.    All  the  while  the  wine-bowl  circulated  freely,  the  rule 


OCCUPATION.  219 

being  that  a  man  might  drink  "  as  much  as  he  could  carry  home 
without  a  guide, —  unless  he  were  far  gone  in  years."  Here  also 
the  Greeks  applied  their  maxim,  "  Never  too  much." 

The  banqueters  usually  consumed  the  night  in  merry-making, 
sometimes  being  broken  in  upon  from  the  street  by  other  bands 
of  revellers,  who  made  themselves  self-invited  guests. 

Occupation.  — The  enormous  body  of  slaves  in  ancient  Greece 
relieved  the  free  population  from  most  of  those  forms  of  labor 
classed  as  drudgery.  The  aesthetic  Greek  regarded  as  degrading 
any  kind  of  manual  labor  that  marred  the  symmetry  or  beauty  of 
the  bedy. 

At  Sparta,  and  in  other  states  where  oligarchical  institutions 
prevailed,  the  citizens  formed  a  sort  of  military  class,  strikingly 
similar  to  the  military  aristocracy  of  Feudal  Europe.  Their  chief 
occupation  was  martial  and  gymnastic  exercises  and  the  adminis- 
tration of  public  affairs.  The  Spartans,  it  will  be  recalled,  were 
forbidden  by  law  to  engage  in  trade.  In  other  aristocratic  states, 
as  at  Thebes,  a  man  by  engaging  in  trade  disqualified  himself  for 
full  citizenship. 

In  the  democratic  states,  however,  speaking  generally,  labor 
and  trade  were  regarded  with  less  contempt.  A  considerable  por- 
tion of  the  citizens  were  traders,  artisans,  and  farmers. 

Life  at  Athens  presented  some  peculiar  features.  All  Attica 
being  included  in  what  we  should  term  the  corporate  limits  of  the 
city,  the  roll  of  Athenian  citizens  included  a  large  body  of  well-to- 
do  farmers,  whose  residence  was  outside  the  city  walls.  The  Attic 
plains,  and  the  slopes  of  the  half-encircling  hills,  were  dotted  with 
beautiful  villas  and  inviting  farmhouses. 

And  then  Athens  being  the  head  of  a  great  empire  of  subject 
cities,  a  large  number  of  Athenian  citizens  were  necessarily  em- 
ployed as  salaried  officials  in  the  minor  positions  of  the  public 
service,  and  thus  politics  became  a  profession.  In  any  event, 
the  meetings  of  the  popular  assembly  and  the  discussion  of  mat- 
ters of  state  engrossed  more  or  less  of  the  time  and  attention  of 
every  citizen. 


220  SOCIAL  LIFE   OF  THE   GREEKS. 

Again,  the  great  Athenian  jury-courts,  which  were  busied  with 
cases  from  all  parts  of  the  empire,  gave  constant  employment  to 
nearly  one  fourth  of  the  citizens,  the  fee  that  the  juryman  received 
enabling  him  to  live  without  other  business.  It  is  said  that,  in  the 
early  morning,  when  the  jurymen  were  passing  through  the  streets 
to  the  different  courts,  Athens  appeared  like  a  city  wholly  given 
up  to  the  single  business  of  law.  Furthermore,  the  great  public 
works,  such  as  temples  and  commemorative  monuments,  which 
were  in  constant  process  of  erection,  afforded  employment  for  a 
vast  number  of  artists  and  skilled  workmen  of  every  class. 

In  the  Agora,  again,  at  any  time  of  the  day,  a  numerous  class 
might  have  been  found  whose  sole  occupation,  as  in  the  case  of 
Socrates,  was  to  talk.  The  writer  of  the  "  Acts  of  the  Apostles  " 
was  so  impressed  with  this  feature  of  life  at  Athens  that  he  sum- 
marized the  habits  of  the  people  by  saying,  "All  the  Athenians, 
and  strangers  which  were  there,  spent  their  time  in  nothing  else, 
but  either  to  tell  or  to  hear  some  new  thing."     (Chap.  xvii.  21.) 

Slavery.  — There  was  a  dark  side  to  Greek  life.  Hellenic  art, 
culture,  refinement  —  "these  good  things  were  planted,  like  ex- 
quisite exotic  flowers,  upon  the  black,  rank  soil  of  slavery." 

The  proportion  of  slaves  to  the  free  population  in  many  of  the 
states  was  astonishingly  large.  In  Corinth  and  ^Egina  there  were 
ten  slaves  to  every  freeman.  In  Attica  the  proportion  was  four  to 
one  ;  that  is  to  say,  out  of  a  population  of  about  500,000,  400,000 
were  slaves.1  Almost  every  freeman  was  a  slave  owner.  It  was 
accounted  a  real  hardship  to  have  to  get  along  with  less  than  half 
a  dozen  slaves. 

This  large  class  of  slaves  was  formed  in  various  ways.  In  the 
prehistoric  period,  the  fortunes  of  war  had  brought  the  entire 
population  of  whole  provinces  into  a  servile  condition,  as  in  cer- 
tain parts  of  the  Peloponnesus.  During  later  times,  the  ordinary 
captives  of  war  still  further  augmented  the  ranks  of  these  unfor- 
tunates.    Their  number  was  also  largely  added  to  by  the  slave 

1  The  population  of  Attica  in  317  B.C.  is  reckoned  at  about  527,000.  That 
of  Athens  in  its  best  days  was  probably  not  far  from  150,000. 


SLA  VER  Y.  22 1 

traffic  carried  on  with  the  barbarian  peoples  of  Asia  Minor.  Crimi- 
nals and  debtors,  too,  were  often  condemned  to  servitude ;  while 
foundlings  were  usually  brought  up  as  slaves. 

The  relation  of  master  and  slave  was  regarded  by  the  Greek 
as  being,  not  only  a  legal,  but  a  natural  one.  A  free  community, 
in  his  view,  could  not  exist  without  slavery.  It  formed  the  nat- 
ural basis  of  both  the  family  and  the  state,  —  the  relation  of  master 
and  slave  being  regarded  as  "  strictly  analogous  to  the  relation  of 
soul  and  body."  Even  Aristotle  and  other  Greek  philosophers 
approved  the  maxim  that  "slaves  are  simply  domestic  animals 
possessed  of  intelligence."  They  were  regarded  as  just  as  neces- 
sary in  the  economy  of  the  family  as  cooking  utensils. 

In  general,  Greek  slaves  were  not  treated  harshly — judging 
their  treatment  by  the  standard  of  humanity  that  prevailed  in 
antiquity.  Some  held  places  of  honor  in  the  family,  and  enjoyed 
the  confidence  and  even  the  friendship  of  their  master.  Yet  at 
Sparta,  where  slavery  assumed  the  form  of  serfdom,  the  lot  of  the 
slave  was  peculiarly  hard  and  unendurable. 

If  slavery  was  ever  justified  by  its  fruits,  it  was  in  Greece.  The 
brilliant  civilization  of  the  Greeks  was  its  product,  and  could 
never  have  existed  without  it.  As  one  truthfully  says,  "  Without 
the  slaves  the  Attic  democracy  would  have  been  an  impossibility, 
for  they  alone  enabled  the  poor,  as  well  as  the  rich,  to  take  a  part 
in  public  affairs."  Relieving  the  citizen  of  all  drudgery,  the  sys- 
tem created  a  class  characterized  by  elegant  leisure,  refinement, 
and  culture. 

We  find  an  almost  exact  historical  parallel  to  all  this  in  the 
feudal  aristocracy  of  Mediaeval  Europe.  Such  a  society  has  been 
well  likened  to  a  great  pyramid,  whose  top  may  be  gilded  with 
light,  while  the  base  lies  in  dark  shadows.  The  civilization  of 
ancient  Hellas  was  splendid  and  attractive,  but  it  rested  with  a 
crushing  weight  upon  all  the  lower  orders  of  Greek  society. 


SECTION    III.  — ROMAN    HISTORY. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

THE    ROMAN   KINGDOM. 

(Legendary  Date,  753-509  B.C.) 

Divisions  of  Italy.  — The  peninsula  of  Italy,  like  that  of  Greece, 
divides  itself  into  three  parts  —  Northern,  Central,  and  Southern 
Italy.  The  first  comprises  the  great  basin  of  the  Po,  lying  between 
the  Alps  and  the  Apennines.  In  ancient  times  this  part  of  Italy 
included  three  districts  —  Liguria,  Gallia  Cisalpina,  which  means 
"  Gaul  on  this  (the  Italian)  side  of  the  Alps,"  and  Venetia. 

The  countries  of  Central  Italy  were  Etruria,  Latium,  and  Cam- 
pania, facing  the  Western,  or  Tuscan  Sea ;  Umbria  and  Picenum, 
looking  out  over  the  Eastern,  or  Adriatic  Sea ;  and  Samnium  and 
the  country  of  the  Sabines,  occupying  the  rough  mountain  dis- 
tricts of  the  Apennines. 

Southern  Italy  comprised  the  countries  of  Apulia,  Lucania, 
Calabria,  and  Bruttium.  Calabria  occupied  the  "heel,"  and 
Bruttium  formed  the  "  toe,"  of  the  peninsula.  This  part  of  Italy, 
as  we  have  already  learned,  was  called  Magna  Graecia,  or  "  Great 
Greece,"  on  account  of  the  number  and  importance  of  the  Greek 
cities  that  during  the  period  of  Hellenic  supremacy  were  estab- 
lished in  these  regions. 

The  large  island  of  Sicily,  lying  just  off  the  mainland  on  the 
south,  may  be  regarded  simply  as  a  detached  fragment  of  Italy, 
so  intimately  has  its  history  been  interwoven  with  that  of  the 
peninsula.  In  ancient  times  it  was  the  meeting-place  and  battle- 
ground of  the  Carthaginians,  Greeks,  and  Romans. 


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EARL  Y  INHABITANTS   OF  ITAL  Y.  223 

Early  Inhabitants  of  Italy.  —  There  were,  in  early  times,  three 
chief  races  in  Italy  —  the  Italians,  the  Etruscans,  and  the  Greeks. 
The  Italians,  a  branch  of  the  Aryan  family,  embraced  many  tribes 
(Latins,  Umbrians,  Sabines,  Samnites,  etc.),  that  occupied  nearly 
all  Central  Italy.  The  Etruscans,  a  wealthy,  cultured,  and  mari- 
time people  of  uncertain  race,  dwelt  in  Etruria,  now  Tuscany. 
Before  the  rise  of  the  Romans  they  were  the  leading  race  in  the 
peninsula.  Of  the  establishment  of  the  Greek  cities  in  Southern 
Italy,  we  have  already  learned  in  connection  with  Grecian  History 
(p.  in). 

Some  five  hundred  years  B.C.,  the  Gauls,  a  Celtic  race,  came 
over  the  Alps,  and  settling  in  Northern  Italy,  became  formidable 
enemies  of  the  infant  republic  of  Rome. 

The  Latins.  —  Most  important  of  all  the  Italian  peoples  were 
the  Latins,  who  dwelt  in  Latium,  between  the  Tiber  and  the 
Liris.  These  people,  like  all  the  Italians,  were  near  kindred  of 
the  Greeks,  and  brought  with  them  into  Italy  those  same  customs, 
manners,  beliefs,  and  institutions  which  we  have  seen  to  have 
been  the  common  possession  of  the  various  branches  of  the  Aryan 
household  (see  p.  5).  There  are  said  to  have  been  in  all  Latium 
thirty  towns,  and  these  formed  an  alliance  known  as  the  Latin 
League.  The  city  which  first  assumed  importance  and  leader- 
ship among  the  towns  of  this  confederation  was  Alba  Longa,  the 
"  Long  White  City,"  so  called  because  its  buildings  stretched  for 
a  great  distance  along  the  summit  of  a  whitish  ridge. 

The  Beginnings  of  Rome.  — The  place  of  preeminence  among 
the  Latin  towns  was  soon  lost  by  Alba  Longa,  and  gained  by 
another  city.  This  was  Rome,  the  stronghold  of  the  Ramnes, 
or  Romans,  located  upon  a  low  hill  on  the  south  bank  of  the 
Tiber,  about  fifteen  miles  from  the  sea. 

The  traditions  of  the  Romans  place  the  founding  of  their  city 
in  the  year  753  b.c.  The  town  was  established,  it  would  seem, 
as  an  outpost  to  guard  the  northern  frontier  of  Latium  against  the 
Etruscans. 

Recent   excavations  have  revealed  the  foundations  of  the  old 


224  THE   ROMAN  KINGDOM. 

walls  and  two  of  the  ancient  gates.  We  thus  learn  that  the  city 
at  first  covered  only  the  top  of  the  Palatine  Hill,  one  of  a  cluster 
of  low  eminences  close  to  the  Tiber,  which,  finally  embraced 
within  the  limits  of  the  growing  city,  became  the  famed  "  Seven 
Hills  of  Rome."  From  the  shape  of  its  enclosing  walls,  the  origi- 
nal city  was  called  Roma  Quadrata,  "Square  Rome." 

The  Early  Roman  State :  King,  Senate,  and  Popular  Assem- 
bly. —  The  early  Roman  state  seems  to  have  been  formed  by  the 
union  of  three  communities.  These  constituted  three  tribes, 
known  as  Ramnes  (the  Romans  proper,  who  gave  name  to  the 
mixed  people),  Tities,  and  Luceres.  Each  of  these  tribes  was 
divided  into  ten  wards,  or  districts  (curies)  ;  each  ward  was 
made  up  of  gentes,  or  clans,  and  each  clan  was  composed  of  a 
number  of  families.  The  heads  of  these  families  were  called 
patres,  or  "  fathers,"  and  all  the  members  patricians,  that  is,  "  chil- 
dren of  the  fathers." 

At  the  head  of  the  nation  stood  the  King,  who  was  the  father  of 
the  state.  He  was  at  once  ruler  of  the  people,  commander  of 
the  army,  judge  and  high  priest  of  the  nation,  with  absolute  power 
as  to  life  and  death. 

Next  to  the  king  stood  the  Senate,  or  "  council  of  the  old  men," 
composed  of  the  "  fathers,"  or  heads  of  the  families.  This  council 
had  no  power  to  enact  laws  :  the  duty  of  its  members  was  simply 
to  advise  with  the  king,  who  was  free  to  follow  or  to  disregard 
their  suggestions. 

The  Popular  Assembly  (comitia  curiata)  comprised  all  the  citi- 
zens of  Rome,  that  is,  all  the  members  of  the  patrician  families, 
old  enough  to  bear  arms.  It  was  this  body  that  enacted  the  laws 
of  the  state,  determined  upon  peace  or  war,  and  also  elected  the 
king. 

Classes  of  Society.  —  The  two  important  classes  of  the  popu- 
lation of  Rome  under  the  kingdom  and  the  early  republic,  were 
the  patricians  and  the  plebeians.  The  former  were  the  mem- 
bers of  the  three  original  tribes  that  made  up  the  Roman  people, 
and  at  first  alone  possessed  political  rights.      They  were  proud, 


THE   LEGENDARY  KINGS.  225 

exclusive,  and  tenacious  of  their  inherited  privileges.  The  latter 
were  made  up  chiefly  of  the  inhabitants  of  subjected  cities,  and 
of  refugees  from  various  quarters  that  had  sought  an  asylum  at 
Rome.  They  were  free  to  acquire  property,  and  enjoyed  personal 
freedom,  but  at  first  had  no  political  rights  whatever.  The  greater 
number  were  petty  land-owners,  who  held  and  cultivated  the  soil 
about  the  city.  A  large  part  of  the  early  history  of  Rome  is  sim- 
ply the  narration  of  the  struggles  of  this  class  to  secure  social  and 
political  equality  with  the  patricians. 

Besides  these  two  principal  orders,  there  were  two  other  classes  — 
clients  and  slaves.  The  former  were  attached  to  the  families  of 
patricians,  who  became  their  patrons,  or  protectors.  The  con- 
dition of  the  client  was  somewhat  like  that  of  the  serf  in  the 
feudal  system  of  the  Middle  Ages.  A  large  clientage  was  con- 
sidered the  crown  and  glory  of  a  patrician  house. 

The  slaves  were,  in  the  main,  captives  in  war.  Their  number, 
small  at  first,  gradually  increased  as  the  Romans  extended  their 
conquests,  till  they  outnumbered  all  the  other  classes  taken  to- 
gether, and  more  than  once  turned  upon  their  masters  in  formida- 
ble revolts  that  threatened  the  very  existence  of  the  Roman  state. 

The  Legendary  Kings.  —  For  nearly  two  and  a  half  centuries 
after  the  founding  of  Rome  (from  753  to  509  B.C.,  according  to 
tradition),  the  government  was  a  monarchy.  To  span  this  period, 
the  legends  of  the  Romans  tell  of  the  reigns  of  seven  kings  — 
Romulus,  the  founder  of  Rome ;  Numa,  the  lawgiver ;  Tullus 
Hostilius  and  Ancus  Martius,  conquerors  both  ;  Tarquinius  Priscus, 
the  great  builder ;  Servius  Tullius,  the  reorganizer  of  the  govern- 
ment and  second  founder  of  the  state  ;  and  Tarquinius  Superbus, 
the  haughty  tyrant,  whose  oppressions  led  to  the  abolition  by  the 
people  of  the  office  of  king. 

The  traditions  of  the  doings  of  these  monarchs  and  of  what 
happened  to  them,  blend  hopelessly  fact  and  fable.  We  cannot 
be  quite  sure  even  as  to  the  names.  Respecting  Roman  affairs, 
however,  under  the  last  three  rulers  (the  Tarquins),  who  were  of 
Ktruscan  origin,  some  important  things  are  related,  the  substantial 


226 


THE  ROMAN  KINGDOM. 


truth  of  which  we  may  rely  upon  with  a  fair  degree  of  cer- 
tainty; and  these  matters  we  shall  notice  in  the  following  para- 
graphs. 

Growth  of  Rome  under  the  Tarquins.  — The  Tarquins  extended 
their  authority  over  the  whole  of  Latium.  The  position  of  suprem- 
acy thus  given  Rome  was  naturally  attended  by  the  rapid  growth 
in  population  and  importance  of  the  little  Palatine  city.  The  orig- 
inal walls  soon  became  too  strait  for  the  increasing  multitudes ; 
new  ramparts  were  built  —  tradition  says  under  the  direction  of 


VIEW   OF  THE   CAPITOLINE,   WITH    THE   CLOACA    MAXIMA.     (A  Reconstruction.) 


the  king  Servius  Tullius  —  which,  with  a  great  circuit  of  seven 
miles,  swept  around  the  entire  cluster  of  the  Seven  Hills.  A  large 
tract  of  marshy  ground  between  the  Palatine  and  Capitoline  hills 
was  drained  by  means  of  the  Cloaca  Maxima,  the  "  Great  Sewer," 
which  was  so  admirably  constructed  that  it  has  been  preserved  to 
the  present  day.  It  still  discharges  its  waters  through  a  great  arch 
into  the  Tiber.  The  land  thus  reclaimed  became  the  Forum,  the 
assembling- place  of  the  people.     Upon  the  summit  of  the  Capito- 


THE  NEW  CONSTITUTION.  Ill 

line  Hill,  overlooking  the  Forum,  was  built  the  famous  sanctuary 
called  the  Capitol,  or  the  Capitoline  temple,  where  beneath  the 
same  roof  were  the  shrines  of  Jupiter,  Juno,  and  Minerva,  the 
three  great  national  deities.  Upon  the  level  ground  between 
the  Aventine  and  the  Palatine  was  laid  out  the  Circus  Maximus, 
the  "  Great  Circus,"  where  were  celebrated  the  Roman  games. 

New  Constitution  of  Servius  Tullius.  — The  second  king  of  the 
Etruscan  house,  Servius  Tullius  by  name,  effected  a  most  impor- 
tant change  in  the  constitution  of  the  Roman  state.  He  did  here  at 
Rome  just  what  Solon  at  about  this  time  did  at  Athens  (see  p.  120). 
He  made  property  instead  of  birth  the  basis  of  the  constitution. 
The  entire  population  was  divided  into  five  classes,  the  first  of 
which  included  all  citizens,  whether  patricians  or  plebeians,  who 
owned  twenty  jugera  (about  twelve  acres)  of  land;  the  fifth  and 
lowest  embraced  all  that  could  show  title  to  even  two  jugera.  The 
army  was  made  up  of  the  members  of  the  five  classes ;  as  it  was 
thought  right  and  proper  that  the  public  defence  should  be  the 
care  of  those  who,  on  account  of  their  possessions,  were  most  in- 
terested in  the  maintenance  of  order  and  in  the  protection  of  the 
boundaries  of  the  state. 

The  assembling-place  of  the  military  classes  thus  organized  was 
on  a  large  plain  just  outside  the  city  walls,  called  the  Campus 
Martius,  or  "  Field  of  Mars."  The  meeting  of  these  military 
orders  was  called  the  comitia  centuriata,  or  the  "assembly  of 
hundreds."1  This  body,  which  of  course  was  made  up  of  patri- 
cians and  plebeians,  gradually  absorbed  the  powers  of  the  earlier 
patrician  assembly  {comitia  curiata) . 

The  Expulsion  of  the  Kings.  —  The  legends  make  Tarquinius 
Superbus,  or  Tarquin  the  Proud,  the  last  king  of  Rome.  He  is 
represented  as  a  monstrous  tyrant,  whose  arbitrary  acts  caused 
both  patricians  and  plebeians  to  unite  and  drive  him  and  all  his 
house  into  exile.     This  event,  according  to  tradition,  occurred  in 

1  This  assembly  was  not  organized  by  Servius  Tullius,  but  it  grew  out  of  the 
military  organization  he  created. 


22S  THE  ROMAN  KINGDOM. 

the  year  509  B.C.,  only  one  year  later  than  the  expulsion  of  the 
tyrants  from  Athens  (see  p.  122). 

So  bitterly  did  the  people  hate  the  tyranny  they  had  abolished 
that  it  is  said  they  all,  the  nobles  as  well  as  the  commons,  bound 
themselves  by  most  solemn  oaths'  never  again  to  tolerate  a  king. 
We  shall  hereafter  see  how  well  this  vow  was  kept  for  nearly  five 
hundred  years. 

The  Roman  Religion. 

The  Chief  Roman  Deities.  —  The  basis  of  the  Roman  religious 
system  was  the  same  as  that  of  the  Grecian :  the  germs  of  its  in- 
stitutions were  brought  from  the  same  home  in  Central  Asia.  At 
the  head  of  the  Pantheon  stood  Jupiter,  identical  in  all  essential 
attributes  with  the  Hellenic  Zeus.  He  was  the  special  protector 
of  the  Roman  people.  To  him,  together  with  Juno  and  Minerva, 
was  consecrated,  as  we  have  already  noticed,  a  magnificent  temple 
upon  the  summit  of  the  Capitoline  Hill,  overlooking  the  Forum 
and  the  city.  Mars,  the  god  of  war,  standing  next  in  rank,  was 
the  favorite  deity  and  the  fabled  father  of  the  Roman  race,  who 
were  fond  of  calling  themselves  the  "  children  of  Mars."  They 
proved  themselves  worthy  offspring  of  the  war-god.  Martial  games 
and  festivals  were  celebrated  in  his  honor  during  the  first  month 
of  the  Roman  year,  which  bore,  and  still  bears,  in  his  honor,  the 
name  of  March.  Janus  was  a  double-faced  deity,  "  the  god  of 
the  beginning  and  the  end  of  everything."  The  month  of  January 
was  sacred  to  him,  as  were  also  all  gates  and  doors.  The  gates  of 
his  temple  were  always  kept  open  in  time  of  war  and  shut  in  time 
of  peace. 

The  fire  upon  the  household  hearth  was  regarded  as  the  symbol 
of  the  goddess  Vesta.  Her  worship  was  a  favorite  one  with  the 
Romans.  The  nation,  too,  as  a  single  great  family,  had  a  common 
national  hearth  in  the  Temple  of  Vesta,  where  the  sacred  fires 
were  kept  burning  from  generation  to  generation  by  six  virgins, 
daughters  of  the  Roman  state.  The  Lares  and  Penates  were 
household  gods.     Their  images  were  set  in  the  entrance  of  the 


ORACLES  AND  DIVINATION. 


229 


dwelling.      The  Lares  were  the  spirits  of  ancestors,  which  were 
thought  to  linger  about  the  home  as  its  guardians. 

Oracles  and  Divination.  —  The  Romans,  like  the  Greeks, 
thought  that  the  will  of  the  gods  was  communicated  to  men  by 
means  of  oracles,  and  by  strange  sights,  unusual  events,  or  singular  co- 
incidences. There  were 
no  true  oracles  at  Rome. 
The  Romans,  therefore, 
often  had  recourse  to 
those  in  Magna  Graecia, 
even  sending  for  advice, 
in  great  emergencies,  to 
the  Delphian  shrine. 
From  Etruria  was  intro- 
duced the  art  of  the 
haruspices,  or  sooth- 
sayers, which  consisted 
in  discovering  the 
divine  mind  by  the  ap- 
pearance of  victims 
slain  for  the  sacrifices. 

The  Sacred  Colleges. 
—  The  four  chief  sa- 
cred colleges,  or  socie- 
ties, were  the  Keepers 
of  the  Sibylline  Books, 
the  College  of  Augurs, 
the  College  of  Pontiffs,  and  the  College  of  the  Heralds. 

A  curious  legend  is  told  of  the  Sibylline  Books.  An  old 
woman  came  to  Tarquinius  Superbus  and  offered  to  sell  him,  for 
an  extravagant  price,  nine  volumes.  As  the  king  declined  to  pay 
the  sum  demanded,  the  woman  departed,  destroyed  three  of  the 
books,  and  then,  returning,  offered  the  remainder  at  the  very 
same  sum  that  she  had  wanted  for  the  complete  number.  The 
king  still  refused  to  purchase ;   so  the  sibyl  went  away  and  de- 


VESTAL   VIRGIN. 


230  THE  ROMAN  KINGDOM. 

stroyed  three  more  of  the  volumes,  and  bringing  back  the  remain- 
ing three,  asked  the  same  price  as  before.  Tarquin  was  by  this 
time  so  curious  respecting  the  contents  of  the  mysterious  books 
that  he  purchased  the  remaining  volumes.  It  was  found  upon 
examination  that  they  were  filled  with  prophecies  respecting  the 
future  of  the  Roman  people.  The  books  were  placed  in  a  stone 
chest,  which  was  kept  in  a  vault  beneath  the  Capitoline  temple ; 
and  special  custodians  were  appointed  to  take  charge  of  them  and 
interpret  them.  The  number  of  keepers,  throughout  the  most 
important  period  of  Roman  history,  was  fifteen.  The  books  were 
consulted  only  in  times  of  extreme  danger. 

The  duty  of  the  members  of  the  College  of  Augurs  \f&s  to 
interpret  the  omens,  or  auspices,  which  were  casual  sights  or 
appearances,  by  which  means  it  was  believed  that  Jupiter  made 
known  his  will.  Great  skill  was  required  in  the  "  taking  of  the 
auspices,"  as  it  was  called.  No  business  of  importance,  public  or 
private,  was  entered  upon  without  first  consulting  the  auspices,  to 
ascertain  whether  they  were  favorable.  The  public  assembly,  for 
illustration,  must  not  convene,  to  elect  officers  or  to  enact  laws, 
unless  the  auspices  had  been  taken  and  found  propitious.  Should 
a  peal  of  thunder  occur  while  the  people  were  holding  a  meeting, 
that  was  considered  an  unfavorable  omen,  and  the  assembly  must 
instantly  disperse. 

The  College  of  Pontiffs  was  so  called  because  one  of  the 
duties  of  its  members  was  to  keep  in  repair  the  bridges  (pontes} 
over  which  the  religious  processions  were  accustomed  to  pass. 
This  was  the  most  important  of  all  the  religious  institutions  of  the 
Romans ;  for  to  the  pontiffs  belonged  the  superintendence  of  all 
religious  matters.  In  their  keeping,  too,  was  the  calendar,  and 
they  could  lengthen  or  shorten  the  year,  which  power  they  some- 
times used  to  extend  the  office  of  a  favorite  or  to  cut  short  that 
of  one  who  had  incurred  their  displeasure.  The  head  of  the 
college  was  called  Pontifex  Maximus,  or  the  Chief  Bridge-builder, 
which  title  was  assumed  by  the  Roman  emperors,  and  after  them 
by  the  Christian  bishops  of  Rome ;  and  thus  the  name  has  come 
down  to  our  own  times. 


SACRED    GAMES.  231 

The  College  of  Heralds  had  the  care  of  all  public  matters  per- 
taining to  foreign  nations.  If  the  Roman  people  had  suffered  any 
wrong  from  another  state,  it  was  the  duty  of  the  heralds  to  demand 
satisfaction.  If  this  was  denied,  and  war  determined  upon,  then 
a  herald  proceeded  to  the  frontier  of  the  enemy's  country  and 
hurled  over  the  boundary  a  spear  dipped  in  blood.  This  was  a 
declaration  of  war.  The  Romans  were  very  careful  in  the  observ- 
ance of  this  ceremony. 

Sacred  Games. — The  Romans  had  many  religious  games  and 
festivals.  Prominent  among  these  were  the  so-called  Circensian 
Games,  or  Games  of  the  Circus,  which  were  very  similar  to  the 
sacred  games  of  the  Greeks  (see  p.  106).  They  consisted,  in 
the  main,  of  chariot-racing,  wrestling,  foot-racing,  and  various 
other  athletic  contests. 

These  festivals,  as  in  the  case  of  those  of  the  Greeks,  had  their 
origin  in  the  belief  that  the  gods  delighted  in  the  exhibition  of 
feats  of  skill,  strength,  or  endurance ;  that  their  anger  might  be 
appeased  by  such  spectacles ;  or  that  they  might  be  persuaded 
by  the  promise  of  games  to  lend  aid  to  mortals  in  great  emergen- 
cies. At  the  opening  of  the  year  it  was  customary  for  the  Roman 
magistrate,  in  behalf  of  the  people,  to  promise  to  the  gods  games 
and  festivals,  provided  good  crops,  protection  from  pestilence,  and 
victory  were  granted  the  Romans  during  the  year.  So,  too,  a 
general  in  great  straits  in  the  field  might,  in  the  name  of  the  state, 
vow  plays  to  the  gods,  and  the  people  were  sacredly  bound  by  his 
act  to  fulfil  the  promise.  Plays  given  in  fulfilment  of  vows  thus 
made  were  called  votive  games. 

Towards  the"  close  of  the  republic  these  games  lost  much  of 
their  religious  character,  and  at  last  became  degraded  into  mere 
brutal  shows  given  by  ambitious  leaders  for  the  purpose  of  winning 
popularity. 


232  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 


CHAPTER    XXIII. 

THE  EARLY   ROMAIC  REPUBLIC  :    CONQUEST  OF   ITALY. 

(509-264   B.C.) 

The  First  Consuls.  —  With  the  monarchy  overthrown  and  the 
last  king  and  his  house  banished  from  Rome,  the  people  set  to 
work  to  reorganize  the  government.  In  place  of  the  king,  there 
were  elected  (by  the  comitia  centuriata,  in  which  assembly  the 
plebeians  had  a  place)  two  patrician  magistrates,  called  consuls,1 
who  were  chosen  for  one  year,  and  were  invested  with  all  the 
powers,  save  some  priestly  functions,  that  had  been  held  by  the 
monarch  during  the  regal  period. 

In  public  each  consul  was  attended  by  twelve  servants,  called 
lictors,  each  of  whom  bore  an  axe  bound  in  a  bundle  of  rods 
{fasces),  the  symbols  of  the  authority  of  the  consul  to  flog  and 
to  put  to  death.  Within  the  limits  of  the  city,  however,  the  axe 
must  be  removed  from  the  fasces,  by  which  was  indicated  that  no 
Roman  citizen  could  be  put  to  death  by  the  consuls  without  the 
consent  of  the  public  assembly. 

Lucius  Junius  Brutus  and  Tarquinius  Collatinus  were  the  first 
consuls  under  the  new  constitution.  But  it  is  said  that  the  very 
name  of  Tarquinius  was  so  intolerable  to  the  people  that  he  was 
forced  to  resign  the  consulship,  and  that  he  and  all  his  house  were 
driven  out  of  Rome.2  Another  consul,  Publius  Valerius,  was 
chosen  in  his  stead. 

1  That  is,  colleagues.  Each  consul  had  the  power  of  obstructing  the  acts  or 
vetoing  the  commands  of  the  other.  In  times  of  great  public  danger  the  con- 
suls were  superseded  by  a  special  officer  called  a  dictator,  whose  term  of 
office  was  limited  to  six  months,  but  whose  power  during  this  time  was  as 
unlimited  as  that  of  the  kings  had  been. 

2  The  truth  is,  he  was  related  to  the  exiled  royal  family,  and  the  people  were 
distrustful  of  his  loyalty  to  the  republic. 


SECESSION  OF   THE  PLEBEIANS. 


233 


First  Secession  of  the  Plebeians  (494  b.c.)  .  —  Taking  advantage 
of  the  disorders  that  followed  the  political  revolution,  the  Latin 
towns  which  had  been  forced  to  acknowledge  the  supremacy  of 


LICTORS 


Rome  rose  in  revolt,  and  the  result  was  that  almost  all  the  con- 
quests that  had  been  made  under  the  kings  were  lost.  For  a  long 
time  the  little  republic  had  to  struggle  hard  for  bare  existence. 

Troubles  without  brought  troubles  within.     The  poor  plebeians, 
during  this  period  of  disorder  and  war,  fell  in  debt  to  the  wealthy 


234  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

class,  —  for  the  Roman  soldier  went  to  war  at  his  own  charge, 
equipping  and  feeding  himself,  — and  payment  was  exacted  with 
heartless  severity.  A  debtor  became  the  absolute  property  of  his 
creditor,  who  might  sell  him  as  a  slave  to  pay  the  debt,  and  in 
some  cases  even  put  him  to  death.  All  this  was  intolerable.  The 
plebeians  determined  to  secede  from  Rome  and*  build  a  new  city 
for  themselves  on  a  neighboring  eminence,  called  afterwards  the 
Sacred  Hill.  They  marched  away  in  a  body  from  Rome  to  the 
chosen  spot,  and  began  making  preparations  for  erecting  new 
homes  (494  B.C.). 

The  Covenant  and  the  Tribunes.  — The  patricians  saw  clearly 
that  such  a  division  must  prove  ruinous  to  the  state,  and  that  the 
plebeians  must  be  persuaded  to  give  up  their  enterprise  and  come 
back  to  Rome.  The  consul  Valerius  was  sent  to  treat  with  the 
insurgents.  The  plebeians  were  at  first  obstinate,  but  at  last  were 
persuaded  to  yield  to  the  entreaties  of  the  embassy  to  return, 
being  won  to  this  mind,  so  it  is  said,  by  one  of  the  wise  senators, 
Menenius,  who  made  use  of  the  well-known  fable  of  the  Body  and 
the  Members. 

The  following  covenant  was  entered  into,  and  bound  by  the 
most  solemn  oaths  and  vows  before  the  gods  :  The  debts  of  the 
poor  plebeians  were  to  be  cancelled  and  those  held  in  slavery  set 
free ;  and  two  magistrates  (the  number  was  soon  increased  to 
ten) ,  called  tribunes,  whose  duty  it  should  be  to  watch  over  the 
plebeians,  and  protect  them  against  the  injustice,  harshness,  and 
partiality  of  the  patrician  magistrates,  were  to  be  chosen  from  the 
commons.  The  persons  of  these  officers  were  made  sacred.  Any 
one  interrupting  a  tribune  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties,  or  doing 
him  any  violence,  was  declared  an  outlaw,  whom  any  one  might 
kill.  That  the  tribunes  might  be  always  easily  found,  they  were 
not  allowed  to  go  more  than  one  mile  beyond  the  city  walls. 
Their  houses  were  to  be  open  night  as  well  as  day,  that  any 
plebeian  unjustly  dealt  with  might  flee  thither  for  protection  and 
refuge. 

We  cannot  overestimate  the  importance  of  the  change  effected 


CORIOLANUS.  235 

in  the  Roman  constitution  by  the  creation  of  this  office  of  the  trib- 
unate. Under  the  protection  and  leadership  of  the  tribunes,  who 
were  themselves  protected  by  oaths  of  inviolable  sanctity,  the  ple- 
beians carried  on  a  struggle  for  a  share  in  the  offices  and  dignities 
of  the  state  which  never  ceased  until  the  Roman  government,  as 
yet  only  republican  in  name,  became  in  fact  a  real  democracy,  in 
which  patrician  and  plebeian  shared  equally  in  all  emoluments  and 
privileges. 

Coriolanus. — The  tradition  of  Coriolanus  illustrates  in  what 
manner  the  tribunes  cared  for  the  rights  of  the  common  people 
and  protected  them  from  the  oppression  of  the  nobles.  During 
a  severe  famine  at  Rome,  Gelon,  the  King  of  Syracuse,  sent  large 
quantities  of  grain  to  the  capital  for  distribution  among  the  suffer- 
ing poor.  A  certain  patrician,  Coriolanus  by  name,  made  a  proposal 
that  none  of  the  grain  should  be  given  to  the  plebeians  save  on  con- 
dition that  they  give  up  their  tribunes.  These  officials  straightway 
summoned  him  before  the  plebeian  assembly,1  on  the  charge  of 
having  broken  the  solemn  covenant  of  the  Sacred  Mount,  and  so 
bitter  was  the  feeling  against  him  that  he  was  obliged  to  flee  from 
Rome. 

He  now  allied  himself  with  the  Volscians,  enemies  of  Rome, 
and  even  led  their  armies  against  his  native  city.  An  embassy 
from  the  Senate  was  sent  to  him,  to  sue  for  peace.  But  the  spirit 
of  Coriolanus  was  bitter  and  revengeful,  and  he  would  listen  to 
none  of  their  proposals.  Nothing  availed  to  move  him  until  his 
mother,  at  the  head  of  a  train  of  Roman  matrons,  came  to  his 
tent,  and  with  tears  pleaded  with  him  to  spare  the  city.  Her 
entreaties  and  the  "  soft  prayers  "  of  his  own  wife  and  children 

1  The  Assembly  of  Tribes  (comitia  tribute?) ,  an  assembly  which  came  into 
existence  about  this  time.  It  was  made  up  wholly  of  plebeians,  and  was  pre- 
sided over  by  the  tribunes.  Later,  there  came  into  existence  another  tribal 
assembly,  which  was  composed  of  patricians  and  plebeians,  and  presided  over 
by  consuls  or  praetors.  Some  authorities  are  inclined  to  regard  these  two 
assemblies  as  one  and  the  same  body;  but  others,  among  whom  is  Mommsen, 
with  probably  better  reason,  look  upon  them  as  two  distinct  organizations. 


236  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

prevailed,  and  with  the  words  "  Mother,  thou  hast  saved  Rome, 
but  lost  thy  son,"  he  led  away  the  Volscian  army. 

Cincinnatus  made  Dictator.  —  The  enemies  of  Rome,  taking 
advantage  of  the  dissensions  of  the  nobles  and  commons,  pressed 
upon  the  frontiers  of  the  republic  on  all  sides.  In  458  B.C.,  the 
^Equians,  while  one  of  the  consuls  was  away  fighting  the  Sabines, 
defeated  the  forces  of  the  other,  and  shut  them  up  in  a  narrow 
valley,  whence  escape  seemed  impossible.  There  was  great  terror 
in  Rome  when  news  of  the  situation  of  the  army  was  brought  to 
the  city. 

The  Senate  immediately  appointed  Cincinnatus,  a  noble  patri- 
cian, dictator.  The  ambassadors  that  carried  to  him  the  message 
from  the  Senate  foUnd  him  upon  his  little  farm  near  the  Tiber,  at 
work  behind  the  plough.  Accepting  the  office  at  once,  he  hastily 
gathered  an  army,  marched  to  the  relief  of  the  consul,  captured 
the  entire  army  of  the  ^Equians,  and  sent  them  beneath  the  yoke.1 
Cincinnatus  then  led  his  army  back  to  Rome  in  triumph,  laid 
down  his  office,  and  sought  again  the  retirement  of  his  farm. 

The  Decemvirs  and  the  Tables  of  Laws. — Written  laws  are 
always  a  great  safeguard  against  oppression.  Until  what  shall 
constitute  a  crime  and  what  shall  be  its  penalty  are  clearly  written 
down  and  well  known  and  understood  by  all,  judges  may  render 
unfair  decisions,  or  inflict  unjust  punishment,  and  yet  run  lit- 
tle risk  —  unless  they  go  altogether  too  far  —  of  being  called  to 
an  account;  for  no  one  but  themselves  knows  what  the  law  or 
the  penalty  really  is.  Hence  in  all  struggles  of  the  people  against 
the  tyranny  of  the  ruling  class,  the  demand  for  written  laws  is  one 
of  the  first  measures  taken  by  the  people  for  the  protection  of 
their  persons  and  property.  Thus  we  have  seen  the  people  of 
Athens,  early  in  their  struggle  with  the  nobles,  demanding  and 
obtaining  a  code  of  written  laws  (see  p.  119).  The  same  thing 
now  took  place  at  Rome.     The  plebeians  demanded  that  a  code 

1  This  was  formed  of  two  spears  thrust  firmly  into  the  ground  and  crossed 
a  few  feet  from  the  earth  by  a  third.  Prisoners  of  war  were  forced  to  pass 
beneath  this  yoke  as  a  symbol  of  submission. 


THE  DECEMVIRS.  1V1 

of  laws  be  drawn  up,  in  accordance  with  which  the  consuls,  who 
exercised  judicial  powers,  should  render  their  decisions.  The 
patricians  offered  a  stubborn  resistance  to  their  wishes,  but  finally 
were  forced  to  yield  to  the  popular  clamor. 

A  commission  was  sent  to  the  Greek  cities  of  Southern  Italy 
and  to  Athens  to  study  the  Grecian  laws  and  customs.  Upon  the 
return  of  this  embassy,  a  commission  of  ten  magistrates,  who  were 
known  as  decemvirs,  was  appointed  to  frame  a  code  of  laws 
(451  B.C.).  These  officers,  while  engaged  in  this  work,  were  also 
to  administer  the  entire  government,  and  so  were  invested  with 
the  supreme  power  of  the  state.  The  patricians  gave  up  their 
consuls  and  the  plebeians  their  tribunes.  At  the  end  of  the  first 
year,  the  task  of  the  board  was  quite  far  from  being  finished,  so 
a  new  decemvirate  was  elected  to  complete  the  work.  Appius 
Claudius  was  the  only  member  of  the  old  board  that  was  returned 
to  the  new. 

The  code  was  soon  finished,  and  the  laws  were  written  on 
twelve  tablets  of  brass,  which  were  fastened  to  the  rostrum,  or 
orator's  platform  in  the  Forum,  where  they  might  be  seen  and 
read  by  all.  These  "  Laws  of  the  Twelve  Tables  "  were  to  Roman 
jurisprudence  what  the  good  laws  of  Solon  (see  p.  120)  were  to 
the  Athenian  constitution.  They  formed  the  basis  of  all  new 
legislation  for  many  centuries,  and  constituted  a  part  of  the  educa- 
tion of  the  Roman  youth  —  every  school-boy  being  required  to 
learn  them  by  heart. 

Misrule  and  Overthrow  of  the  Decemvirs.  — The  first  decemvirs 
used  the  great  power  lodged  in  their  hands  with  justice  and  pru- 
dence ;  but  the  second  •  board,  under  the  leadership  of  Appius 
Claudius,  instituted  a  most  infamous  and  tyrannical  rule.  The 
result  was  a  second  secession  of  the  plebeians  to  the  Sacred  Hill. 
This  procedure,  which  once  before  had  proved  so  effectual  in 
securing  justice  to  the  oppressed,  had  a  similar  issue  now.  The 
situation  was  so  critical  that  the  decemvirs  were  forced  to  resign. 
The  consulate  and  the  tribunate   were   restored.      Eight  of  the 


238  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

decemvirs  were  forced  to  go  into  exile ;  Appius  Claudius  and  one 
other,  having  been  imprisoned,  committed  suicide. 

Consular,  or  Military  Tribunes. — The  overthrow  of  the  de- 
cemvirate  was  followed  by  a  long  struggle  between  the  nobles  and 
the  commons,  which  was  an  effort  on  the  part  of  the  latter  to  gain 
admission  to  the  consulship ;  for  up  to  this  time  only  a  patrician 
could  hold  that  office.  The  contention  resulted  in  a  compromise. 
It  was  agreed  that,  in  place  of  the  two  consuls,  the  people  might 
elect  from  either  order  magistrates,  who  should  be  known  as  "  mili- 
tary tribunes  with  consular  powers."  These  officers,  whose  num- 
bers varied,  differed  from  consuls  more  in  name  than  in  functions 
or  authority.  In  fact,  the  plebeians  had  gained  the  office,  but  not 
the  name  (444  B.C.). 

The  Censors.  —  No  sooner  had  the  plebeians  virtually  secured 
admission  to  the  consulship,  than  the  jealous  and  exclusive  patri- 
cians commenced  scheming  to  rob  them  of  the  fruit  of  the  victory 
they  had  gained.  They  effected  this  by  taking  from  the  consulate 
some  of  its  most  distinctive  duties  and  powers,  and  conferring 
them  upon  two  new  patrician  officers  called  censors.  The  func- 
tions of  these  magistrates  were  many  and  important.  They  took 
the  census,  and  thus  assigned  to  every  man  his  position  in  the 
different  classes  of  the  citizens ;  and  they  could,  for  immorality 
or  any  improper  conduct,  not  only  degrade  a  man  from  his  rank, 
but  deprive  him  of  his  vote.  It  was  their  duty  to  watch  the  public 
morals  and  in  case  of  necessity  to  administer  wholesome  advice. 
Thus  we  are  told  of  their  reproving  the  young  Romans  for  wear- 
ing tunics  with  long  sleeves  —  an  Oriental  and  effeminate  custom 
—  and  for  neglecting  to  marry  upon  arriving  at  a  proper  age. 
From  the  name  of  these  Roman  officers  comes  our  word  censori- 
ous, meaning  fault-finding. 

The  first  censors  were  elected  probably  in  the  year  444  b.c.  ; 
about  one  hundred  years  afterwards,  in  351  B.C.,  the  plebeians 
secured  the  right  of  holding  this  office  also. 

Siege  and  Capture  of  Veii.  —  We  must  now  turn  to  notice  the 
fortunes  of  Rome  in  war.     Almost  from  the  founding  of  the  city, 


THE   SACKING    OF  ROME. 


239 


we  find  its  warlike  citizens  carrying  on  a  fierce  contest  with  their 
powerful  Etruscan  neighbors  on  the  north.  Veii  was  one  of  the 
largest  and  richest  of  the  cities  of  Etruria.  Around  this  the  war 
gathered.  The  Romans,  like  the  Gre- 
cians at  Troy,  attacked  its  walls  for  ten 
years.  The  length  of  the  siege,  and 
the  necessity  of  maintaining  a  force 
permanently  in  the  field,  led  to  the 
establishment  of  a  paid  standing  army ; 
for  hitherto  the  soldier  had  not  only 
equipped  himself,  but  had  served  with- 
out pay.  Thus  was  laid  the  basis  of 
that  military  power  which  was  destined 
to  effect  the  conquest  of  the  world, 
and  then,  in  the  hands  of  ambitious 
and  favorite  generals,  to  overthrow  the 
republic  itself. 

The  capture  of  Veii  by  the  dictator 
Camillus  (396  B.C.)  was  followed  by 
that  of  many  other  Etruscan  towns. 
Rome   was   enriched  by  their  spoils, 

and  became  the  centre  of  a  large  and  lucrative  trade.  The  fron- 
tiers of  the  republic  were  pushed  out  even  beyond  the  utmost 
limits  of  the  kingdom  before  its  overthrow.  All  that  was  lost 
by  the  revolution  had  been  now  regained,  and  much  besides  had 
been  won.  At  this  moment  there  broke  upon  the  city  a  storm 
from  the  north,  which  all  but  cut  short  the  story  we  are  narrating. 

Sack  of  Rome  by  the  Gauls  (390  B.C.).  —  We  have  already 
mentioned  how,  in  very  remote  times,  the  tribes  of  Gaul  crossed 
the  Alps  and  established  themselves  in  Northern  Italy  (see  p. 
223).  While  the  Romans  were  conquering  the  towns  of  Etruria, 
these  barbarian  hordes  were  moving  southward,  and  overrunning 
and  devastating  the  countries  of  Central  Italy. 

News  was  brought  to  Rome  that  they  were  advancing  upon  that 
city.     A  Roman  army  met  them  on  the  banks  of  the  river  Allia, 


ROMAN    SOLDIER. 


240 


THE   EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 


eleven  miles  from  the  capital.'  The  Romans  were  driven  in  great 
panic  from  the  field.  It  would  be  impossible  to  picture  the  con- 
sternation and  despair  that  reigned  at  Rome  when  the  fugitives 
brought  to  the  city  intelligence  of  the  terrible  disaster.  It  was 
never  forgotten,  and  the  day  of  the  battle  of  Allia  was  ever  after 
a  black  day  in  the  Roman  calendar.  The  sacred  vessels  of  the 
temples  were  buried ;    the  eternal  fires  of  Vesta  were  hurriedly 


GAULS    IN    SIGHT   OF   ROME. 


borne  by  their  virgin  keepers  to  a  place  of  safety  in  Etruria ;  and 
a  large  part  of  the  population  fled  in  dismay  across  the  Tiber. 
No  attempt  was  made  to  defend  any  portion  of  the  city  save  the 
citadel.  This  stronghold  was  kept  by  a  little  garrison,  under  the 
command  of  the  hero  Marius  Manlius.  A  tradition  tells  how, 
when  the  barbarians,  under  cover  of  the  darkness  of  night,  had 
climbed  the  steep  rock  and  had  almost  effected  an  entrance  to 


THE   REBUILDING    OF  ROME.  241 

the  citadel,  the  defenders  were  awakened  by  the  cackling  of  some 
geese,  which  the  piety  of  the  famishing  soldiers  had  spared, 
because  these  birds  were  sacred  to  Juno. 

News  was  now  brought  the  Gauls  that  the  Venetians  were  over- 
running their  possessions  in  Northern  Italy.  This  led  them  to 
open  negotiations  with  the  Romans.  For  one  thousand  pounds 
of  gold,  according  to  the  historian  Livy,  the  Gauls  agreed  to  retire 
from  the  city.  As  the  story  runs,  while  the  gold  was  being  weighed 
out  in  the  Forum,  the  Romans  complained  that  the  weights  were 
false,  when  Brennus,  the  Gallic  leader,  threw  his  sword  also  into 
the  scales,  exclaiming,  "  Va  victis!"  "Woe  to  the  vanquished." 
Just  at  this  moment,  so  the  tale  continues,  Camillus,  a  brave  patri- 
cian general,  appeared  upon  the  scene  with  a  Roman  army  that 
had  been  gathered  from  the  fugitives ;  and,  as  he  scattered  the 
barbarians  with  heavy  blows,  he  exclaimed,  "  Rome  is  ransomed 
with  steel  and  not  with  gold."  According  to  one  account  Brennus 
himself  was  taken  prisoner ;  but  another  tradition  says  that  he 
escaped,  carrying  with  him  not  only  the  ransom,  but  a  vast  booty 
besides. 

The  Rebuilding  of  Rome. — When  the  fugitives  returned  to 
Rome  after  the  withdrawal  of  the  Gauls,  they  found  the  city  a 
heap  of  ruins.  Some  of  the  poorer  classes,  shrinking  from  the 
labor  of  rebuilding  their  old  homes,  proposed  to  abandon  the  site 
and  make  Veii  their  new  capital.  But  love  for  the  old  spot  at 
last  prevailed  over  all  the  persuasions  of  indolence,  and  the  people, 
with  admirable  courage,  set  themselves  to  the  task  of  rebuilding 
their  homes.  It  was  a  repetition  of  the  scene  at  Athens  after 
the  retreat  of  the  Persians  (see  p.  136).  The  city  was  speedily 
restored,  and  was  soon  enjoying  her  old  position  of  supremacy 
among  the  surrounding  states.  There  were  some  things,  how- 
ever, which  even  Roman  resolution  and  perseverance  could  not 
restore.  These  were  the  ancient  records  and  documents,  through 
whose  irreparable  loss  the  early  history  of  Rome  is  involved  in 
great  obscurity  and  uncertainty. 

Treason  and   Death  of  Manlius.  —  The  ravages  of  the  Gauls 


242  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

left  the  poor  plebeians  in  a  most  pitiable  condition.  In  order  to 
rebuild  their  dwellings  and  restock  their  farms,  they  were  obliged 
to  borrow  money  of  the  rich  patricians,  and  consequently  soon 
began  again  to  experience  the  insult  and  oppression  that  were  ever 
incident  to  the  condition  of  the  debtor  class  at  Rome. 

The  patrician  Manlius,  the  hero  of  the  brave  defence  of  the 
Capitol,  now  came  forward  as  the  champion  of  the  plebeians. 
He  sold  the  larger  part  of  his  estates,  and  devoted  the  proceeds  to 
the  relief  of  the  debtor  class.  It  seems  evident  that  in  thus  under- 
taking the  cause  of  the  commons  he  had  personal  aims  and  ambi- 
tions. The  patricians  determined  to  crush  him.  He  was  finally 
brought  to  trial  before  the  popular  assembly,  on  the  charge  of 
conspiring  to  restore  the  office  of  king.  From  the  Forum,  where 
the  people  were  gathered,  the  Capitol,  which  Manlius  had  so 
bravely  defended  against  the  barbarians,  was  in  full  sight.  Point- 
ing to  the  temples  he  had  saved,  he  appealed  to  the  gods  and  to 
the  gratitude  of  the  Roman  people.  The  people  responded  to  the 
appeal  in  a  way  altogether  natural.  They  refused  to  condemn  him. 
But  brought  to  trial  a  second  time,  and  now  in  a  grove  whence 
the  citadel  could  not  be  seen,  he  was  sentenced  to  death,  and  was 
thrown  from  the  Tarpeian  Rock.1     This  event  occurred  384  B.C. 

Plebeians  admitted  to  the  Consulship.  —  For  nearly  half  a  cen- 
tury after  the  death  of  Manlius  the  most  important  events  in  the 
history  of  Rome  centre  about  the  struggle  of  the  plebeians  for 
admission  to  those  offices  of  the  government  whence  the  jealousy 
of  the  patricians  still  excluded  them.  The  Licinian  laws,  so  called 
from  one  of  their  proposers,  the  tribune  C.  Licinius,  besides  reliev- 
ing the  'poor  of  usurious  interest,  and  effecting  a  more  just  division 
of  the  public  lands,  also  provided  that  consuls  should  be  chosen 
yearly,  as  at  first  (see  p.  238),  and  that  one  of  the  consuls  should 

1  The  Tarpeian  Rock  was  the  name  given  to  the  cliff  which  the  Capitoline 
Hill  formed  on  the  side  towards  the  Tiber  (or  towards  the  Palatine,  according 
to  some).  It  received  its  name  from  Tarpeia,  daughter  of  one  of  the  legen- 
dary keepers  of  the  citadel.  State  criminals  were  frequently  executed  by  being 
thrown  from  this  rock. 


THE   FIRST  SAM  NIT E    WAR.  243 

be  a  plebeian.  This  last  provision  opened  to  any  one  of  the  ple- 
beian class  the  highest  office  in  the  state.  The  nobles,  when  they 
saw  that  it  would  be  impossible  to  resist  the  popular  demand,  had 
recourse  to  the  old  device.  They  effected  a  compromise,  whereby 
the  judicial  powers  of  the  consuls  were  taken  from  them  and  con- 
ferred upon  a  new  magistrate,  who  bore  the  name  of  praetor. 
Only  patricians,  of  course,  were  to  be  eligible  to  this  new  office. 
They  then  permitted  the  Licinian  laws  to  pass  (367  B.C.). 

During  the  latter  half  of  the  fourth  century  B.C.  (between  the 
years  356-300)  the  plebeians  gained  admittance  to  the  dictator- 
ship, the  censorship,  the  praetorship,  and  to  the  College  of  Augurs 
and  the  College  of  Pontiffs.  They  had  been  admitted  to  the 
College  of  Priests  having  charge  of  the  Sibylline  books,  at  the  time 
of  the  passing  of  the  Licinian  laws.  With  plebeians  in  all  these 
positions,  the  rights  of  the  lower  order  were  fairly  secured  against 
oppressive  and  partisan  decisions  on  the  part  of  the  magistrates, 
and  against  party  fraud  in  the  taking  of  the  auspices  and  in  the 
regulation  of  the  calendar.  There  was  now  political  equality 
between  the  nobility  and  the  commonalty. 

Wars  for  the  Mastery  of  Italy. 

The  First  Samnite  War  (343-341  b.c).  —  The  union  of  the  two 
orders  in  the  state  allowed  the  Romans  now  to  employ  their  un- 
divided strength  in  subjugating  the  different  states  of  the  peninsula. 
The  most  formidable  competitors  of  the  Romans  for  supremacy  in 
Italy  were  the  Samnites,  rough  and  warlike  mountaineers  who  held 
the  Apennines  to  the  east  of  Latium.  They  were  worthy  rivals  of 
the  "  children  of  Mars."  The  successive  struggles  between  these 
martial  races  are  known  as  the  First,  Second,  and  Third  Samnite 
wars.  They  extended  over  a  period  of  half  a  century,  and  in  their 
course  involved  almost  all  the  states  of  Italy. 

Of  the  first  of  this  series  of  wars  we  know  very  little,  although 
Livy  wrote  a  long,  but  unfortunately  very  unreliable,  narration  of 
it.     In  the  midst  of  the  struggle,  Rome  was  confronted  by  a  dan- 


244  THE   EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

gerous  revolt  of  her  Latin  allies,  and,  leaving  the  war  unfinished, 
turned  her  forces  upon  the  insurgents. 

Revolt  of  the  Latin  Cities  (340-338  b.c).  —  The  strife  between 
the  Romans  and  their  Latin  allies  was  simply  the  old  contest  within 
the  walls  of  the  capital  between  the  patricians  and  the  plebeians 
transferred  to  a  larger  arena.  As  the  nobles  had  oppressed  the 
commons,  so  now  both  these  orders  united  in  the  oppression  of 
the  Latins  —  the  plebeians  in  their  bettered  circumstances  forget- 
ting the  lessons  of  adversity.  The  Latin  allies  demanded  a  share 
in  the  government,  and  that  the  lands  acquired  by  conquest 
should  be  distributed  among  them  as  well  as  among  Roman  citi- 
zens. The  Romans  refused.  All  Latium  rose  in  revolt  against  the 
injustice  and  tyranny  of  the  oppressor. 

After  about  three  years'  hard  fighting,  the  rebellion  was  sub- 
dued. The  Latin  League  was  now  broken  up.  Some  of  the 
towns  retained  their  independence  (Tibur,  Praeneste,  and  Cora)  j 
some  received  full  Roman  citizenship  (Aricia,  Lanuvium,  and 
Nomentum)  ;  while  others  received  only  the  private  rights  of 
Roman  citizens,  the  right  of  suffrage  being  withheld. 

Second  and  Third  Samnite  Wars  (326-290  b.c).  —  In  a  few 
years  after  the  close  of  the  Latin  contest,  the  Romans  were  at  war 
again  with  their  old  rivals,  the  Samnites.  Notwithstanding  the 
latter  were  thoroughly  defeated  in  this  second  contest,  still  it  was 
not  long  before  they  were  again  in  arms  and  engaged  in  their  third 
struggle  with  Rome.  This  time  they  had  formed  a  powerful  co- 
alition which  embraced  all  the  states  of  Italy,  including  the  Greek 
cities  in  the  south  and  the  Gallic  tribes  in  the  north. 

Roman  courage  rose  with  the  danger.  The  united  armies  of 
the  league  met  with  a  most  disastrous  defeat  (at  Sentinum,  295 
B.C.),  and  the  power  of  the  coalition  was  broken.  One  after  an- 
other the  states  that  had  joined  the  alliance  were  chastised.  The 
Samnites  were  overpowered,  the  Gauls  were  routed,  the  Etruscans 
were  crushed,  and  all  the  important  Greek  cities  of  Southern  Italy, 
save  Tarentum,  were  forced  to  acknowledge  the  supremacy  of  Rome. 

War  with  Pyrrhus  (282-272  b.c).  —  Tarentum  was  one  of  the 


WAR    WITH  PYRRHUS.  245 

most  noted  of  the  Hellenic  cities  of  Magna  Graecia.  It  was  a  sea- 
port on  the  Calabrian  coast,  and  had  grown  opulent  through  the 
extended  trade  of  its  merchants.  The  capture  of  some  Roman 
vessels,  and  an  insult  offered  to  an  envoy  of  the  republic  by  the 
Tarentines,  led  to  a  declaration  of  war  against  them  by  the  Roman 
Senate.  The  Tarentines  turned  to  Greece  for  aid.  Pyrrhus,  king 
of  Epirus,  a  cousin  of  Alexander  the  Great,  who  had  an  ambition  to 
build  up  such  an  empire  in  the  West  as  his  renowned  kinsman  had 
established  in  the  East,  responded  to  their  entreaties,  and  crossed 
over  into  Italy  with  a  small  army  of  Greek  mercenaries  and  twenty 
war-elephants.  He  organized  and  drilled  the  effeminate  Taren- 
tines, and  soon  felt  prepared  to  face  the  Romans. 

The  hostile  armies  met  at  Heraclea  (280  B.C.).  It  is  said  that 
when  Pyrrhus,  who  had  underestimated  his  foe,  observed  the  skill 
which  the  Romans  evinced  in  forming  their  line  of  battle,  he  ex- 
claimed, in  admiration,  "  In  war,  at  least,  these  men  are  not  bar- 
barians." The  battle  was  won  for  Pyrrhus  by  his  war-elephants, 
the  sight  of  which,  being  new  to  the  Romans,  caused  them  to  flee 
from  the  field  in  dismay.  But  Pyrrhus  had  lost  thousands  of  his 
bravest  troops.  Victories  gained  by  such  losses  in  a  country  where 
he  could  not  recruit  his  army,  he  saw  clearly,  meant  final  defeat. 
As  he  looked  over  the  battle-field,  he  is  said  to  have  turned  to  his 
companions  and  remarked,  "Another  such  victory,  and  I  must 
return  to  Epirus  alone."  He  noticed  also,  and  not  without  appre- 
ciating its  significance,  that  the  wounds  of  the  Roman  soldiers 
killed  in  the  action  were  all  in  front.  "  Had  I  such  soldiers," 
said  he,  "  I  should  soon  be  master  of  the  world." 

The  prudence  of  the  victorious  Pyrrhus  led  him  to  send  to  the 
Romans  an  embassy  with  proposals  of  peace.  When  the  Senate 
hesitated,  its  resolution  was  fixed  by  the  eloquence  of  the  aged 
Appius  :  "  Rome,"  exclaimed  he,  "  shall  never  treat  with  a  victori- 
ous foe."  The  ambassadors  were  obliged  to  return  to  Pyrrhus 
unsuccessful  in  their  mission. 

Pyrrhus,  according  to  the  Roman  story-tellers,  who  most  lavishly 
embellished  this  chapter  of  their  history,  was  not  more  successful 


246  THE  EARLY  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

in  attempts  at  bribery  than  in  the  arts  of  negotiation.  Upon  his 
attempting  by  large  offers  of  gold  to  win  Fabricius,  who  had  been 
intrusted  by  the  Senate  with  an  important  embassy,  the  sturdy  old 
Roman  replied,  "Poverty,  with  an  honest  name,  is  more  to  be 
desired  than  wealth." 

After  a  second  victory,  as  disastrous  as  his  first,  Pyrrhus  crossed 
over  into  Sicily,  to  aid  the  Grecians  there  in  their  struggle  with 
the  Carthaginians.  At  first  he  was  everywhere  successful;  but 
finally  fortune  turned  against  him,  and  he  was  glad  to  escape  from 
the  island.  Recrossing  the  straits  into  Italy,  he  once  more 
engaged  the  Romans,  but  at  the  battle  of  Beneventum  suffered  a 
disastrous  and  final  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the  consul  Curius 
Dentatus  (274  B.C.).  Leaving  a  sufficient  force  to  garrison 
Tarentum,  the  baffled  and  disappointed  king  set  sail  for  Epirus. 
He  had  scarcely  embarked  before  Tarentum  surrendered  to  the 
Romans  (272  B.C.).  This  ended  the  struggles  for  the  mastery  of 
Italy.  Rome  was  now  mistress  of  all  the  peninsula  south  of  the 
Arnus  and  the  Rubicon.  It  was  now  her  care  to  consolidate  these 
possessions,  and  to  fasten  her  hold  upon  them,  by  means  of  a 
perfect  network  of  colonies 1  and  military  roads. 

1  "  Colonies  were  not  all  of  the  same  character.  They  must  be  distin- 
guished into  two  classes  —  the  colonies  of  Roman  citizens  and  the  Latin  colo- 
nies. The  colonies  of  Roman  citizens  consisted  usually  of  three  hundred  men 
of  approved  military  experience,  who  went  forth  with  their  families  to  occupy 
conquered  cities  of  no  great  magnitude,  but  which  were  important  as  military 
positions,  being  usually  on  the  sea-coast.  These  three  hundred  families 
formed  a  sort  of  patrician  caste,  while  the  old  inhabitants  sank  into  the  con- 
dition formerly  occupied  by  the  plebeians  at  Rome.  The  heads  of  these  fami- 
lies retained  all  their  rights  as  Roman  citizens,  and  might  repair  to  Rome  to 
vote  in  the  popular  assemblies."  —  Liddell's  History  of  Rome. 

The  Latin  colonies  numbered  about  thirty  at  the  time  of  the  Second  Punic 
War.  A  few  of  these  were  colonies  that  had  been  founded  by  the  old  Latin 
Confederacy  ;  but  the  most  were  towns  that  had  been  established  by  Rome 
subsequent  to  the  dissolution  of  the  League  (see  p.  244).  The  term  Latin 
was  applied  to  these  later  colonies  of  purely  Roman  origin,  for  the  reason  that 
they  enjoyed  the  same  rights  as  the  Latin  towns  that  had  retained  their  inde- 
pendence. Thus  the  inhabitants  of  a  Latin  colony  possessed  some  of  the 
most  valuable  of  the  private  rights  of  Roman  citizens,  but  they  had  no  politi- 
cal rights  at  the  capital. 


CARTHAGE.  247 


CHAPTER    XXIV. 

THE    FIRST   PUNIC   WAR. 

(264-241    B.C.) 

Carthage  and  the  Carthaginian  Empire.  —  Foremost  among 
the  cities  founded  by  the  Phoenicians  upon  the  different  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean  was  Carthage,  upon  the  northern  coast  of 
Africa.  The  city  is  thought  to  have  had  its  beginnings  in  a  small 
trading-post,  established  late  in  the  ninth  century  B.C.,  about  one 
hundred  years  before  the  founding  of  Rome.  Carthage  was 
simply  another  Tyre.  She  was  mistress  and  queen  of  the  Western 
Mediterranean.  At  the  period  we  have  now  reached,  she  held 
sway,  through  peaceful  colonization  or  by  force  of  arms,  over  all 
the  northern  coast  of  Africa  from  the  Greater  Syrtis  to  the  Pillars 
of  Hercules,  and  possessed  the  larger  part  of  Sicily,  as  well  as 
Sardinia,  Corsica,  the  Balearic  Isles,  Southern  Spain,  and  scores 
of  little  islands  scattered  here  and  there  in  the  neighboring  seas. 
With  all  its  shores  dotted  with  her  colonies  and  fortresses,  and 
swept  in  every  direction  by  the  Carthaginian  war-galleys,  the 
Western  Mediterranean  had  become  a  "  Phoenician  lake,"  in 
which,  as  the  Carthaginians  boasted,  no  one  dared  wash  his  hands 
without  their  permission. 

Carthaginian  Government  and  Religion. — The  government 
of  Carthage,  like  that  of  Rome,  was  republican  in  form.  Corre- 
sponding to  the  Roman  consuls,  two  magistrates,  called  Suffetes, 
stood  at  the  head  of  the  state.  The  Senate  was  composed  of  the 
heads  of  the  leading  families ;  its  duties  and  powers  were  very  like 
those  of  the  Roman  Senate.  So  well-balanced  was  the  constitu- 
tion, and  so  prudent  was  its  administration,  that  six  hundred  years 
of  Carthaginian  history  exhibited  not  a  single  revolution. 

The  religion  of  the  Carthaginians  was  the  old  Canaanitish  wor- 


248  THE  FIRST  PUNIC    WAR. 

ship  of  Baal,  or  the  Sun.  To  Moloch,  —  another  name  for  the 
fire-god,  —  "  who  rejoiced  in  human  victims  and  in  parents'  tears," 
they  offered  human  sacrifices. 

Rome  and  Carthage  compared. — These  two  great  republics, 
which  for  more  than  five  centuries  had  been  slowly  extending 
their  limits  and  maturing  their  powers  upon  the  opposite  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean,  were  now  about  to  begin  one  of  the  most 
memorable  struggles  of  all  antiquity  —  a  duel  that  was  to  last,  with 
every  vicissitude  of  fortune,  for  over  one  hundred  years. 

As  was  the  case  in  the  contest  between  Athens  and  Sparta,  so 
now  the  two  rival  cities,  with  their  allies  and  dependencies,  were 
very  nearly  matched  in  strength  and  resources.  The  Romans,  it 
is  true,  were  almost  destitute  of  a  navy ;  while  the  Carthaginians 
had  the  largest  and  most  splendidly  equipped  fleet  that  ever 
patrolled  the  waters  of  the  Mediterranean.  But  although  the 
Carthaginians  were  superior  to  the  Romans  in  naval  warfare,  they 
were  greatly  their  inferiors  in  land  encounters.  The  Carthaginian 
territory,  moreover,  was  widely  scattered,  embracing  extended 
coasts  and  isolated  islands ;  while  the  Roman  possessions  were 
compact,  and  confined  to  a  single  and  easily  defended  peninsula. 
Again,  the  Carthaginian  armies  were  formed  chiefly  of  mercenaries, 
while  those  of  Rome  were  recruited  very  largely  from  the  ranks  of 
the  Roman  people.  And  then  the  subject  states  of  Carthage  were 
mostly  of  another  race,  language,  and  religion  from  their  Phoeni- 
cian conquerors,  and  were  ready,  upon  the  first  disaster  to  the 
ruling  city,  to  drop  away  from  their  allegiance ;  while  the  Latin 
allies  and  Italian  dependencies  of  Rome  were  close  kindred  to  her 
in  race  and  religion,  and  so,  through  natural  impulse,  for  the  most 
part  remained  loyal  to  her  during  even  the  darkest  periods  of  her 
struggle  with  her  rival. 

The  Beginning  of  the  War.  —  Lying  between  Italy  and  the  coast 
of  Africa  is  the  large  island  of  Sicily.  It  is  in  easy  sight  of  the 
former,  and  its  southernmost  point  is  only  ninety  miles  from  the 
latter.  At  the  commencement  of  the  First  Punic  War,  the  Car- 
thaginians held  possession  of  all  the  island  save  a  strip  of  the 


FIRS T  NAVAL    VICTORY.  249 

eastern  coast,  which  was  under  the  sway  of  the  Greek  city  of  Syra- 
cuse. The  Greeks  and  Carthaginians  had  carried  on  an  almost 
uninterrupted  struggle  through  two  centuries  for  the  control  of  the 
island.  The  Romans  had  not  yet  set  foot  upon  it.  But  it  was 
destined  to  become  the  scene  of  the  most  terrible  encounters  be- 
tween the  armaments  of  the  two  rivals.  Pyrrhus  had  foreseen  it 
all.  As  he  withdrew  from  the  island,  he  said,  "  What  a  fine  battle- 
field we  are  leaving  for  the  Romans  and  Carthaginians." 

In  the  year  264  B.C.,  on  a  flimsy  pretext  of  giving  protection  to 
some  friends,  the  Romans  crossed  over  to  the  island.  That  act 
committed  them  to  a  career  of  foreign  conquest  destined  to  con- 
tinue till  their  arms  had  made  the  circuit  of  the  Mediterranean. 

The  Syracusans  and  Carthaginians,  old  enemies  and  rivals 
though  they  had  been,  joined  their  forces  against  the  insolent  new- 
comers. The  allies  were  completely  defeated  in  the  first  battle, 
and  the  Roman  army  obtained  a  sure  foothold  upon  the  island. 

In  the  following  year  both  consuls  were  placed  at  the  head  of 
formidable  armies  for  the  conquest  of  Sicily.  A  large  portion  of 
the  island  was  quickly  overrun,  and  many  of  the  cities  threw  off 
their  allegiance  to  Syracuse  and  Carthage,  and  became  allies  of 
Rome.  Hiero,  king  of  Syracuse,  seeing  that  he  was  upon  the 
losing  side,  deserted  the  cause  of  the  Carthaginians,  and  formed 
an  alliance  with  the  Romans,  and  ever  after  remained  their  firm 
friend. 

The  Romans  gain  their  First  Naval  Victory  (260  B.C.). — 
Their  experience  during  the  past  campaigns  had  shown  the  Ro- 
mans that  if  they  were  to  cope  successfully  with  the  Carthaginians, 
they  must  be  able  to  meet  them  upon  the  sea  as  well  as  upon  the 
land.  So  they  determined  to  build  a  fleet.  A  Carthaginian  gal- 
ley that  had  been  wrecked  upon  the  shores  of  Italy,  served  as  a 
pattern.  It  is  affirmed  that,  within  the  almost  incredibly  short 
space  of  sixty  days,  a  growing  forest  was  converted  into  a  fleet  of 
one  hundred  and  twenty  war  galleys. 

The  consul  C.  Duillius  was  entrusted  with  the  command  of  the 
fleet     He  met  the  Carthaginian  squadron  near  the  city  and  prom- 


250  THE  FIRST  PUNIC    WAR. 

ontory  of  Myfee,  on  the  northern  coast  of  Sicily.  Now,  distrust- 
ing their  ability  to  match  the  skill  of  their  enemy  in  naval  tactics, 
the  Romans  had  provided  each  of  their  vessels  with  a  drawbridge. 
As  soon  as  a  Carthaginian  ship  came  near  enough  to  a  Roman 
vessel,  this  gangway  was  allowed  to  fall  upon  the  approaching 
galley;  and  the  Roman  soldiers,  rushing  along  the  bridge,  were 
soon  engaged  in  a  hand-to-hand  conflict  with  their  enemies,  in 
which  species  of  encounter  the  former  were  unequalled.  The 
result  was  a  complete  victory  for  the  Romans. 

The  joy  at  Rome  was  unbounded.  It  inspired  in  the  more 
sanguine  splendid  visions  of  maritime  command  and  glory.  The 
Mediterranean  should  speedily  become  a  Roman  lake,  in  which  no 
vessel  might  float  without  the  consent  of  Rome. 

The  Romans  carry  the  War  into  Africa.  —  The  results  of  the 
naval  engagement  at  Mytoe  encouraged  the  Romans  to  push  the 
war  with  redoubled  energy.  They  resolved  to  carry  it  into  Africa. 
An  immense  Carthaginian  fleet  that  disputed  the  passage  of  the 
Roman  squadron  was  almost  annihilated,  and  the  Romans  dis- 
embarked near  Carthage.  Regulus,  one  of  the  consuls  who  led 
the  army  of  invasion,  sent  word  to  Rome  that  he  had  sealed  up  the 
gates  of  Carthage  with  terror.  Finally,  however,  Regulus  suffered 
a  crushing  defeat,  and  was  made  prisoner.  A  fleet  which  was  sent 
to  bear  away  the  remnants  of  the  shattered  army  was  wrecked  in 
a  terrific  storm  off  the  coast  of  Sicily,  and  the  shores  of  the  island 
were  strewn  with  the  wreckage  of  between  two  and  three  hundred 
ships  and  with  the  bodies  of  one  hundred  thousand  men. 

Undismayed  at  the  terrible  disaster  that  had  overtaken  the 
transport  fleet,  the  Romans  set  to  work  to  build  another,  and 
made  a  second  descent  upon  the  African  coast.  The  expedition, 
however,  accomplished  nothing  of  importance ;  and  the  fleet  on 
its  return  voyage  was  almost  destroyed,  just  off  the  coast  of  Italy, 
by  a  tremendous  storm. 

Regulus  and  the  Carthaginian  Embassy.  —  For  a  few  years 
the  Romans  refrained  from  tempting  again  the  hostile  powers  of 
the  sea,  and  Sicily  became  once  more  the  battle-ground  of  the 


THE    CARTHAGINIAN  EMBASSY.  251 

contending  rivals.  At  last,  having  lost  a  great  battle  (battle  of 
Panormus,  251  B.C.),  the  Carthaginians  became  dispirited,  and 
sent  an  embassy  to  Rome,  to  negotiate  for  peace,  or,  if  that  could 
not  be  reached,  to  effect  an  exchange  of  prisoners.  Among  the 
commissioners  was  Regulus,  who  since  his  capture,  five  years 
before,  had  been  held  a  prisoner  in  Africa.  Before  setting  out 
from  Carthage  he  had  promised  to  return  if  the  embassy  were  un- 
successful. For  the  sake  of  his  own  release,  the  Carthaginians 
supposed  he  would  counsel  peace,  or  at  least  urge  an  exchange  of 
prisoners.  But  it  is  related,  that  upon  arrival  at  Rome,  he  coun- 
selled war  instead  of  peace,  at  the  same  time  revealing  to  the 
Senate  the  enfeebled  condition  of  Carthage.  As  to  the  exchange 
of  prisoners,  he  said,  "  Let  those  who  have  surrendered  when  they 
ought  to  have  died,  die  in  the  land  which  has  witnessed  their 
disgrace." 

The  Roman  Senate,  following  his  counsel,  rejected  all  the  pro- 
posals of  the  embassy ;  and  Regulus,  in  spite  of  the  tears  and 
entreaties  of  his  wife  and  friends,  turned  away  from  Rome,  and 
set  out  for  Carthage  to  bear  such  fate  as  he  well  knew  the 
Carthaginians,  in  their  disappointment  and  anger,  would  be  sure 
to  visit  upon  him. 

The  tradition  goes  on  to  tell  how,  upon  his  arrival  at  Carthage, 
he  was  confined  in  a  cask  driven  full  of  spikes,  and  then  left  to 
die  of  starvation  and  pain.  This  part  of  the  tale  has  been  dis- 
credited, and  the  finest  touches  of  the  other  portions  are  supposed 
to  have  been  added  by  the  story-tellers. 

Loss  of  Two  More  Roman  Fleets.  — After  the  failure  of  the 
Carthaginian  embassy,  the  war  went  on  for  several  years  by  land 
and  sea  with  varying  vicissitudes.  At  last,  on  the  coast  of  Sicily, 
one  of  the  consuls,  Claudius,  met  with  an  overwhelming  defeat. 
Almost  a  hundred  vessels  of  his  fleet  were  lost.  The  disaster 
caused  the  greatest  alarm  at  Rome.  Superstition  increased  tin 
fears  of  the  people.  It  was  reported  that  just  before  the  battle, 
when  the  auspices  were  being  taken,  and  the  sacred  chickens 
would  not  eat,  Claudius  had  given  orders  to  have  them  thrown 


252  THE  FIRST  PUNIC    WAR. 

into  the  sea,  irreverently  remarking,  "  At  any  rate,  they  shall  drink." 
Imagination  was  free  to  depict  what  further  evils  the  offended 
gods  might  inflict  upon  the  Roman  state. 

The  gloomiest  forebodings  might  have  found  justification  in 
subsequent  events.  The  other  consul  just  now  met  with  a  great 
disaster.  He  was  proceeding  along  the  southern  coast  of  Sicily 
with  a  squadron  of  eight  hundred  merchantmen  and  over  one 
hundred  war  galleys,  the  former  loaded  with  grain  for  the  Roman 
army  on  the  island.  A  severe  storm  arising,  the  squadron  was 
beaten  to  pieces  upon  the  rocks.  Not  a  single  ship  escaped. 
The  coast  for  miles  was  strewn  with  broken  planks,  and  with 
bodies,  and  heaped  with  vast  windrows  of  grain  cast  up  by  the 
waves. 

Close  of  the  First  Punic  War.  —  The  war  had  now  lasted  for 
fifteen  years.  Four  Roman  fleets  had  been  destroyed,  three  of 
which  had  been  sunk  or  broken  to  pieces  by  storms.  Of  the 
fourteen  hundred  vessels  which  had  been  lost,  seven  hundred  were 
war  galleys,  —  all  large  and  costly  quinqueremes,  that  is,  vessels 
with  five  banks  of  oars.  Only  one  hundred  of  these  had  fallen 
into  the  hands  of  the  enemy ;  the  remainder  were  a  sacrifice  to 
the  malign  and  hostile  power  of  the  waves.  Such  successive 
blows  from  an  invisible  hand  were  enough  to  blanch  the  faces 
even  of  the  sturdy  Romans.  Neptune  manifestly  denied  to  the 
"Children  of  Mars"  the  realm  of  the  sea. 

It  was  impossible  for  the  six  years  following  the  last  disaster  to 
infuse  any  spirit  into  the  struggle.  In  247  B.C.,  Hamilcar  Barcas, 
the  father  of  the  great  Hannibal,  assumed  the  command  of  the 
Carthaginian  forces,  and  for  several  years  conducted  the  war  with 
great  ability  on  the  island  of  Sicily,  even  making  Rome  tremble 
for  the  safety  of  her  Italian  possessions. 

Once  more  the  Romans  determined  to  commit  their  cause  to 
the  element  that  had  been  so  unfriendly  to  them.  A  fleet  of  two 
hundred  vessels  was  built  and  equipped,  but  entirely  by  private 
subscription ;  for  the  Senate  feared  that  public  sentiment  would 
not  sustain  them  in  levying  a  tax  for  fitting  up  another  costly 


CLOSE   OF   THE    WAR.  253 

armament  as  an  offering  to  the  insatiable  Neptune.  This  people's 
squadron,  as  we  may  call  it,  was  intrusted  to  the  command  of  the 
consul  Catulus.  He  met  the  Carthaginian  fleet  under  the  com- 
mand of  the  Admiral  Hanno,  near  the  ^Egatian  islands,  and 
inflicted  upon  it  a  crushing  defeat. 

The  Carthaginians  now  sued  for  peace.  A  treaty  was  at  length 
arranged,  the  terms  of  which  required  that  Carthage  should  give 
up  all  claims  to  the  island  of  Sicily,  surrender  all  her  prisoners, 
and  pay  an  indemnity  of  3200  talents  (about  $4,000,000),  one- 
third  of  which  was  to  be  paid  down,  and  the  balance  in  ten  yearly 
payments.  Thus  ended  (241  B.C.),  after  a  continuance  of  twenty- 
four  years,  the  first  great  struggle  between  Carthage  and  Rome. 


254  THE  SECOND  PUNIC   WAR. 


CHAPTER    XXV. 

THE   SECOND   PUNIC  WAR.* 

(2I8-20I  B.C.) 

Rome  between  the  First  and  the  Second  Punic  War. 

The  First  Roman  Province.  —  For  the  twenty-three  years  that 
followed  the  close  of  the  first  struggle  between  Rome  and  Car- 
thage, the  two  rivals  strained  every  power  and  taxed  every  re- 
source in  preparation  for  a  renewal  of  the  contest. 

The  Romans  settled  the  affairs  of  Sicily,  organizing  all  of  it, 
save  the  lands  belonging  to  Syracuse,  as  a  province  of  the  re- 
public. This  was  the  first  territory  beyond  the  limits  of  Italy 
that  Rome  had  conquered,  and  the  Sicilian  the  first  of  Roman 
provinces.  But  as  the  imperial  city  extended  her  conquests,  her 
provincial  possessions  increased  in  number  and  size  until  they 
formed  at  last  a  perfect  cordon  about  the  Mediterranean.  Each 
province  was  governed  by  a  magistrate  sent  out  from  the  capital, 
and  paid  an  annual  tribute,  or  tax,  to  Rome. 

Rome  acquires  Sardinia  and  Corsica. — The  first  acquisition 
by  the  Romans  of  lands  beyond  the  peninsula  seems  to  have 
created  in  them  an  insatiable  ambition  for  foreign  conquests. 
They  soon  found  a  pretext  for  seizing  the  island  of  Sardinia,  the 
most  ancient  and,  after  Sicily,  the  most  prized  of  the  possessions 
of  the  Carthaginians.  The  island,  in  connection  with  Corsica, 
which  was  also  seized,  was  formed  into  a  Roman  province.  With 
her  hands  upon  these  islands,  the  authority  of  Rome  m  the 
Western,  or  Tuscan  Sea,  was  supreme. 

The  Illyrian  Corsairs  are  punished.  —  At  about  the  same  time, 
the  Romans  also  extended  their  influence  over  the  seas  that  wash 
the  eastern  shores  of  Italy.    For  a  long  time  the  Adriatic  and  Ionian 


Lr* 


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LE  mediterranean  lands 

at  the  beginning  of  the 

SECOND  PUNIC  WAR. 

Roman  Possessions  and  Allies         I |        Free  Greek  States       I I 

Carthaginian           do                       E3       Syrian  Possessions     I 
Macedonian  do  I 1       Egyptian        do  I 1 


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paphlagroaia^ 


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WAR    WITH   THE    GAULS.  255 

waters  had  been  infested  with  Illyrian  pirates,  who  issued  from  the 
roadsteads  of  the  northeastern  coasts  of  the  former  sea.  The 
Roman  fleet  chased  these  corsairs  from  the  Adriatic,  and  cap- 
tured several  of  their  strongholds.  Rome  now  assumed  a  sort 
of  protectorate  over  the  Greek  cities  of  the  Adriatic  coasts.  This 
was  her  first  step  towards  final  supremacy  in  Macedonia  and 
Greece. 

War  with  the  Gauls.  —  In  the  north,  during  this  same  period, 
Roman  authority  was  extended  from  the  Apennines  and  the  Ru- 
bicon to  the  foot  of  the  Alps.  Alarmed  at  the  advance  of  the 
Romans,  who  were  pushing  northward  their  great  military  road, 
called  the  Flaminian  Way,  and  also  settling  with  discharged  sol- 
diers and  needy  citizens  the  tracts  of  frontier  land  wrested  some 
time  before  from  the  Gauls,  the  Boii,  a  tribe  of  that  race,  stirred  up 
all  the  Gallic  peoples  already  in  Italy,  besides  their  kinsmen  who 
were  yet  beyond  the  mountains,  for  an  assault  upon  Rome.  In- 
telligence of  this  movement  among  the  northern  tribes  threw  all 
Italy  into  a  fever  of  excitement.  At  Rome  the  terror  was  great ; 
for  not  yet  had  died  out  of  memory  what  the  city  had  once  suf- 
fered at  the  hands  of  the  ancestors  of  these  same  barbarians  that 
were  now  again  gathering  their  hordes  for  sack  and  pillage.  An 
ancient  prediction,  found  in  the  Sibylline  books,  declared  that  a 
portion  of  Roman  territory  must  needs  be  occupied  by  Gauls. 
Hoping  sufficiently  to  fulfil  the  prophecy  and  satisfy  Fate,  the 
Roman  Senate  caused  two  Gauls  to  be  buried  alive  in  one  of  the 
public  squares  of  the  capital. 

Meanwhile  the  barbarians  had  advanced  into  Etruria,  ravaging 
the  country  as  they  moved  southward.  After  gathering  a  large 
amount  of  booty,  they  were  carrying  this  back  to  a  place  of  "safety, 
when  they  were  surrounded  by  the  Roman  armies  at  Telamon,  and 
almost  annihilated  (225  B.C.).  The  Romans,  taking  advantage  of 
this  victory,  pushed  on  into  the  plains  of  the  Po,  captured  the  city 
which  is  now  known  as  Milan,  and  extended  their  authority  to  the 
foot-hills  of  the  Alps. 


256  THE  SECOND  PUNIC    WAR. 


Carthage  between  the  First  and  the  Second  Punic  War. 

The  Truceless  War.  —  Scarcely  had  peace  been  concluded  with 
Rome  at  the  end  of  the  First  Punic  War,  before  Carthage  was 
plunged  into  a  still  deadlier  struggle,  which  for  a  time  threatened 
her  very  existence.  The  mercenary  troops,  upon  their  return  from 
Sicily,  revolted,  on  account  of  not  receiving  their  pay.  Their 
appeal  to  the  native  tribes  of  Africa  was  answered  by  a  general 
uprising  throughout  the  dependencies  of  Carthage.  The  extent 
of  the  revolt  shows  how  hateful  and  hated  was  the  rule  of  the  great 
capital  over  her  subject  states. 

The  war  was  unspeakably  bitter  and  cruel.  It  is  known  in  his- 
tory as  "  The  Truceless  War."  At  one  time  Carthage  was  the  only 
city  remaining  in  the  hands  of  the  government.  But  the  genius 
of  the  great  Carthaginian  general  Hamilcar  Barcas  at  last  tri- 
umphed, and  the  authority  of  Carthage  was  everywhere  restored. 

The  Carthaginians  in  Spain.  —  After  the  disastrous  termination 
of  the  First  Punic  War,  the  Carthaginians  determined  to  repair 
their  losses  by  new  conquests  in  Spain.  Hamilcar  Barcas  was  sent 
over  into  that  country,  and  for  nine  years  he  devoted  his  com- 
manding genius  to  organizing  the  different  Iberian  tribes  into  a 
compact  state,  and  to  developing  the  rich  gold  and  silver  mines  of 
the  southern  part  of  the  peninsula.     He  fell  in  battle  228  B.C. 

Hamilcar  Barcas  was  the  greatest  general  that  up  to  this  time 
the  Carthaginian  race  had  produced.  Genius  is  seldom  transmit- 
ted ;  but  in  the  Barcine  family  the  rule  was  broken,  and  the  rare 
genius  of  Hamilcar  reappeared  in  his  sons,  whom  he  himself,  it  is 
said,  was  fond  of  calling  the  "  lion's  brood."  Hannibal,  the  old- 
est, was  only  nineteen  at  the  time  of  his  father's  death,  and  being 
thus  too  young  to  assume  command,  Hasdrubal,1  the  son-in-law  of 
Hamilcar,  was  chosen  to  succeed  him.  He  carried  out  the  unfin- 
ished plans  of  Hamilcar,  extended  and  consolidated  the  Cartha- 

1  Not  to  be  confounded  with  Hannibal's  own  brother  Hasdrubal.  See  p. 
262. 


HANNIBAL'S    VOW.  257 

ginian  power  in  Spain,  and  upon  the  eastern  coast  founded  New 
Carthage  as  the  centre  and  capital  of  the  newly  acquired  territory. 
The  native  tribes  were  conciliated  rather  than  conquered.  The 
Barcine  family  knew  how  to  rule  as  well  as  how  to  fight. 

Hannibal's  Vow.  —  Upon  the  death  of  Hasdrubal,  which  oc- 
curred 221  B.C.,  Hannibal,  now  twenty-six  years  of  age,  was  by 
the  unanimous  voice  of  the  army  called  to  be  their  leader.  When 
a  child  of  nine  years  he  had  been  led  by  his  father  to  the  altar ; 
and  there,  with  his  hands  upon  the  sacrifice,  the  little  boy  had 
sworn  eternal  hatred  to  the  Roman  race.  He  was  driven  on  to 
his  gigantic  undertakings  and  to  his  hard  fate,  not  only  by  the 
restless  fires  of  his  warlike  genius,  but,  as  he  himself  declared,  by 
the  sacred  obligations  of  a  vow  that  could  not  be  broken. 

Hannibal  attacks  Saguntum.  —  In  two  years  Hannibal  ex- 
tended the  Carthaginian  power  to  the  Ebro.  Saguntum,  a  Greek 
city  upon  the  east  coast  of  Spain,  alone  remained  unsubdued. 
The  Romans,  who  were  jealously  watching  affairs  in  the  peninsula, 
had  entered  into  an  alliance  with  this  city,  and  taken  it,  with  other 
Greek  cities  in  that  quarter  of  the  Mediterranean,  under  their  pro- 
tection. Hannibal,  although  he  well  knew  that  an  attack  upon 
this  place  would  precipitate  hostilities  with  Rome,  laid  siege  to  it 
in  the  spring  of  219  B.C.  He  was  eager  for  the  renewal  of  the  old 
contest.  The  Roman  Senate  sent  messengers  to  him  forbidding 
his  making  war  upon  a  city  which  was  a  friend  and  ally  of  the 
Roman  people ;  but  Hannibal,  disregarding  their  remonstrances, 
continued  the  siege,  and,  after  an  investment  of  eight  months, 
gained  possession  of  the  town. 

The  Romans  now  sent  commissioners  to  Carthage  to  demand 
of  the  Senate  that  they  should  give  up  Hannibal  to  them,  and  by 
so  doing  repudiate  the  act  of  their  general.  The  Carthaginians 
hesitated.  Then  Quintus  Fabius,  chief  of  the  embassy,  gathering 
up  his  toga,  said  :  "  I  carry  here  peace  and  war ;  choose,  men  of 
hage,  which  ye  will  have."  "Give  us  whichever  ye  will,"  was 
the  reply.  "War,  then,"  said  Fabius,  dropping  his  toga.  The 
"  die  was  now  cast ;  and  the  arena  was  cleared  for  the  foremost 


258  THE  SECOND  PUNIC   WAR. 

man  of  his  race  and  his  time,  perhaps  the  mightiest  military  genius 
of  any  race  and  of  any  time." 

The  Second  Punic  War. 

Hannibal's  Passage  of  the  Alps. — The  Carthaginian  empire 
was  now  stirred  with  preparations  for  the  impending   struggle. 


HANNIBAL. 


Hannibal  was  the  life  and  soul  of  every  movement.  His  bold 
plan  was  to  cross  the  Pyrenees  and  the  Alps  and  descend  upon 
Rome  from  the  north. 


THE  PASSAGE    OF  THE  ALPS.  259 

With  his  preparations  completed,  Hannibal  left  New  Carthage 
early  in  the  spring  of  218  B.C.,  with  an  army  numbering  about  one 
hundred  thousand  men,  and  including  thirty-seven  war  elephants. 
Crossing  the  Pyrenees  and  the  Rhone,  he  reached  the  foot-hills  of 
the  Alps.  Nature  and  man  joined  to  oppose  the  passage.  The  sea- 
son was  already  far  advanced  —  it  was  October  —  and  snow  was  fall- 
ing upon  the  higher  portions  of  the  trail.  Day  after  day  the  army 
toiled  painfully  up  the  dangerous  path.  In  places  the  narrow  way 
had  to  be  cut  wider  for  the  monstrous  bodies  of  the  elephants. 
Often  avalanches  of  stone  were  hurled  upon  the  trains  by  the  hostile 
bands  that  held  possession  of  the  heights  above.  At  last  the  sum- 
mit was  gained,  and  the  shivering  army  looked  down  into  the 
warm  haze  of  the  Italian  plains.  The  sight  alone  was  enough  to 
rouse  the  drooping  spirits  of  the  soldiers ;  but  Hannibal  stirred 
them  to  enthusiasm  by  addressing  them  with  these  words :  "  Ye 
are  standing  upon  the  Acropolis  of  Italy;  yonder  lies  Rome." 
The  army  began  its  descent,  and  at  length,  after  toils  and  losses 
equalled  only  by  those  of  the  ascent,  its  thinned  battalions  issued 
from  the  defiles  of  the  mountains  upon  the  plains  of  the  Po.  Of 
the  fifty  thousand  men  and  more  with  which  Hannibal  had  begun 
the  passage,  barely  half  that  number  had  survived  the  march,  and 
these  "  looked  more  like  phantoms  than  men." 

Battles  of  the  Ticinus,  the  Trebia,  and  Lake  Trasimenus.  — 
The  Romans  had  not  the  remotest  idea  of  Hannibal's  plans.  With 
war  determined  upon,  the  Senate  had  sent  one  of  the  consuls,  L. 
Sempronius  Longus,  with  an  army  into  Africa  by  the  way  of  Sicily ; 
while  the  other,  Publius  Cornelius  Scipio,  they  had  directed  to 
lead  another  army  into  Spain. 

While  the  Senate  were  watching  the  movements  of  these  expe- 
ditions, they  were  startled  with  the  intelligence  that  Hannibal, 
instead  of  being  in  Spain,  had  crossed  the  Alps  and  was  among 
the  Gauls  upon  the  Po.  Sempronius  was  hastily  recalled  from 
his  attempt  upon  Africa,  to  the  defence  of  Italy.  Scipio,  on  his 
way  to  Spain,  had  touched  at  Massilia,  and  there  learned  of  the 


260  THE   SECOND  PUNIC    WAR. 

movements  of  Hannibal.  He  turned  back,  hurried  into  Northern 
Italy,  and  took  command  of  the  levies  there.  The  cavalry  of  the 
two  armies  met  upon  the  banks  of  the  Ticinus,  a  tributary  of  the 
Po.  The  Romans  were  driven  from  the  field  by  the  fierce  onset 
of  the  Numidian  horsemen.  Scipio  now  awaited  the  arrival  of 
the  other  consular  army,  which  was  hurrying  up  through  Italy  by 
forced  marches. 

In  the  battle  of  the  Trebia  the  united  armies  of  the  two  consuls 
were  almost  annihilated.  The  Gauls,  who  had  been  waiting  to 
see  to  which  side  fortune  would  incline,  now  flocked  to  the  stand- 
ard of  Hannibal,  and  hailed  him  as  their  deliverer. 

The  spring  following  the  victory  at  the  Trebia,  Hannibal  led  his 
army,  now  recruited  by  many  Gauls,  across  the  Apennines,  and 
moved  southward.  At  Lake  Trasimenus  he  entrapped  the  Ro- 
mans under  Flaminius  in  a  mountain  defile,  where,  bewildered  by 
a  fog  that  filled  the  valley,  the  greater  part  of  the  army  was 
slaughtered,  and  the  consul  himself  was  slain. 

The  way  to  Rome  was  now  open.  Believing  that  Hannibal 
would  march  directly  upon  the  capital,  the  Senate  caused  the 
bridges  that  spanned  the  Tiber  to  be  destroyed,  and  appointed 
Fabius  Maximus  dictator. 

In  one  respect  only  had  events  disappointed  Hannibal's  expec- 
tations. He  had  thought  that  all  the  states  of  Italy  were,  like  the 
Gauls,  ready  to  revolt  from  Rome  at  the  first  opportunity  that 
might  offer  itself.  But  not  a  single  city  had  thus  far  proved  un- 
faithful to  her. 

Fabius  "the  Delayer."  —  The  fate  of  Rome  was  now  in  the 
hands  of  Fabius.  Should  he  risk  a  battle  and  lose  it,  the  destiny  of 
the  capital  would  be  sealed.  He  determined  to  adopt  a  more  pru- 
dent policy  —  to  follow  and  annoy  the  Carthaginian  army,  but  to 
refuse  all  proffers  of  battle.  Thus  time  might  be  gained  for  rais- 
ing a  new  army  and  perfecting  measures  for  the  public  defence. 
In  every  possible  way  Hannibal  endeavored  to  draw  his  enemy 
into  an  engagement.  He  ravaged  the  fields  far  and  wide  and  fired 
the  homesteads  of  the  Italians,  in  order  to  force  Fabius  to  fight  in 


THE  BATTLE   OF  CANNAE.  261 

their  defence.  The  soldiers  of  the  dictator  began  to  murmur. 
They  called  him  Cunctator,  or  "  the  Delayer."  They  even  accused 
him  of  treachery  to  the  cause  of  Rome.  But  nothing  moved  him 
from  the  steady  pursuit  of  the  policy  which  he  clearly  saw  was  the 
only  prudent  one  to  follow. 

The  Battle  of  Cannae.  —  The  time  gained  by  Fabius  enabled  the 
Romans  to  raise  and  discipline  an  army  that  might  hope  success- 
fully to  combat  the  Carthaginian  forces.  Early  in  the  summer  of 
the  year  216  B.C.  these  new  levies,  numbering  80,000  men,  con- 
fronted the  army  of  Hannibal,  amounting  to  not  more  than  half 
that  number,  at  Cannae,  in  Apulia.  It  was  the  largest  army  the 
Romans  had  ever  gathered  on  any  battle-field.  But  it  had  been 
collected  only  to  meet  the  most  overwhelming  defeat  that  ever 
befell  the  forces  of  the  republic.  Through  the  skilful  manoeuvres 
of  Hannibal,  the  Romans  were  completely  surrounded,  and  hud- 
dled together  in  a  helpless  mass  upon  the  field,  and  then  for  eight 
hours  were  cut  down  by  the  Numidian  cavalry.  From  fifty  to 
seventy  thousand  were  slain  j  a  few  thousand  were  taken  prison- 
ers ;  only  the  merest  handful  escaped,  including  one  of  the  con- 
suls. The  slaughter  was  so  great  that,  according  to  Livy,  when 
Mago,  a  brother  of  Hannibal,  carried  the  news  of  the  victory  to 
Carthage,  he,  in  confirmation  of  the  intelligence,  poured  down  in 
the  porch  of  the  Senate-house,  nearly  a  peck  of  gold  rings  taken 
from  the  fingers  of  Roman  knights. 

Events  after  the  Battle  of  Cannae.  —  The  awful  news  flew  to 
Rome.  Consternation  and  despair  seized  the  people.  The  city 
would  have  been  emptied  of  its  population  had  not  the  Senate 
ordered  the  gates  to  be  closed.  Never  did  that  body  display 
greater  calmness,  wisdom,  prudence,  and  resolution.  By  word 
and  act  they  bade  the  people  never  to  despair  of  the  republic. 
Little  by  little  the  panic  was  allayed.  Measures  were  concerted 
for  the  defence  of  the  capital,  as  it  was  expected  that  Hannibal 
would  immediately  march  upon  Rome.  Swift  horsemen  were 
sent  out  along  the  Appian  Way  to  gather  information  of  the  con- 
queror's  movements,  and  to  learn,  as  Livy  expresses  it,  "if  the 


262  THE  SECOND  PUNIC   WAR. 

immortal  gods,  out  of  pity  to  the  empire,  had  left  any  remnant  of 
the  Roman  name." 

The  leader  of  the  Numidian  cavalry,  Maharbal,  urged  Hanni- 
bal to  follow  up  his  victory  closely.  "  Let  me  advance  with  the 
cavalry,"  said  he,  "  and  in  five  days  thou  shalt  dine  in  the  capi- 
tal." But  Hannibal  refused  to  adopt  the  counsel  of  his  impetuous 
general.  Maharbal  turned  away,  and,  with  mingled  reproach  and 
impatience,  exclaimed,  "  Alas  !  thou  knowest  how  to  gain  a  vic- 
tory, but  not  how  to  use  one."  The  great  commander,  while  he 
knew  he  was  invincible  in  the  open  field,  did  not  think  it  prudent 
to  fight  the  Romans  behind  their  walls. 

Hannibal  now  sent  an  embassy  to  Rome  to  offer  terms  of  peace. 
The  Senate,  true  to  the  Appian  policy  never  to  treat  with  a  vic- 
torious enemy  (see  p.  245),  would  not  even  permit  the  ambassa- 
dors to  enter  the  gates.  Not  less  disappointed  was  Hannibal  in 
the  temper  of  the  Roman  allies.  For  the  most  part  they  adhered 
to  the  cause  of  Rome  with  unshaken  loyalty  through  all  these 
trying  times.  Some  tribes  in  the  South  of  Italy,  however,  among 
which  were  the  Lucanians,  the  Apulians,  and  the  Bruttians,  went 
over  to  the  Carthaginians.  Hannibal  marched  into  Campania  and 
quartered  his  army  for  the  winter  in  the  luxurious  city  of  Capua, 
which  had  opened  its  gates  to  him.  Here  he  rested  and  sent 
urgent  messages  to  Carthage  for  re-inforcements,  while  Rome 
exhausted  every  resource  in  raising  and  equipping  new  levies,  to 
take  the  place  of  the  legions  lost  at  Cannae.  For  several  years 
there  was  an  ominous  lull  in  the  war,  while  both  parties  were 
gathering  strength  for  a  renewal  of  the  struggle. 

The  Fall  of  Syracuse  and  of  Capua.  —  In  the  year  216  B.C., 
Hiero,  King  of  Syracuse,  who  loved  to  call  himself  the  friend  and 
ally  of  the  Roman  people,  died,  and  the  government  fell  into  the 
hands  of  a  party  unfriendly  to  the  republic.  An  alliance  was 
formed  with  Carthage,  and  a  large  part  of  Sicily  was  carried  over 
to  the  side  of  the  enemies  of  Rome.  The  distinguished  Roman 
general,  Marcus  Claudius  Marcellus,  called  "  the  Sword  of  Rome," 
was  intrusted  with  the  task  of  reconquering  the  island.  After 
reducing  many  towns,  he  at  last  laid  siege  to  Syracuse. 


THE  FALL    OF  SYRACUSE. 


263 


MARCELLUS,  "The  Sword  of  Rome. 


This  noted  capital  was  then  one  of  the  largest  and  richest  cities 
of  the  Grecian  world.  For  three  years  it  held  out  against  the 
Roman  forces.  It  is  said  that  Archimedes  (see  p.  213),  the  great 
mathematician,  rendered  valuable  aid  to  the  besieged  with  curious 
and  powerful  engines  contrived 
by  his  genius.  But  the  city  fell 
at  last,  and  was  given  over  to 
sack  and  pillage.  Rome  was 
adorned  with  the  rare  works  of 
Grecian  art  —  paintings  and 
sculptures  —  which  for  centuries 

had  been  accumulating  in  this  the  oldest  and  most  renowned  of 
the  colonies  of  ancient  Hellas.  Syracuse  never  recovered  from 
the  blow  inflicted  upon  her  at  this  time  by  the  relentless  Romans. 

Capua  must  next  be  punished  for  opening  her  gates  and  ex- 
tending her  hospitalities  to  the  enemies  of  Rome.  A  line  of 
circumvallation  was  drawn  about  the  devoted  city,  and  two  Roman 
armies  held  it  in  close  siege.  Hannibal,  ever  faithful  to  his  allies 
and  friends,  hastened  to  the  relief  of  the  Capuans.  Unable  to 
break  the  enemy's  lines,  he  marched  directly  upon  Rome,  as  if 
to  make  an  attack  upon  that  city,  hoping  thus  to  draw  off  the 
legions  about  Capua  to  the  defence  of  the  capital.  The  "  dread 
Hannibal  "  himself  rode  alongside  the  walls  of  the  hated  city,  and, 
tradition  says,  even  hurled  a  defiant  spear  over  the  defences. 
The  Romans  certainly  were  trembling  with  fear;  yet  Livy  tells 
how  they  manifested  their  confidence  in  their  affairs  by  selling  at 
public  auction  the  land  upon  which  Hannibal  was  encamped. 
He  in  turn,  in  the  same  manner,  disposed  of  the  shops  front- 
ing the  Forum.  The  story  is  that  there  were  eager  purchasers 
in  both  cases. 

Failing  to  draw  the  legions  from  Capua  as  he  had  hoped,  Han- 
nibal now  retired  from  before  Rome,  and,  retreating  into  the 
southern  part  of  Italy,  abandoned  Capua  to  its  fate.  It  soon 
fell,  and  paid  the  penalty  that  Rome  never  failed  to  inflict  upon 
an  unfaithful  ally.     The  chief  men  in  the  city  were  put  to  death, 


264  THE  SECOND  PUNIC    WAR. 

and  a  large  part  of  the  inhabitants  sold  as  slaves.  Capua  had  as- 
pired to  the  first  place  among  the  cities  of  Italy :  scarcely  more 
than  the  name  of  the  ambitious  capital  now  remained. 

Hasdrubal  attempts  to  carry  Aid  to  his  Brother.  —  During  all 
the  years  Hannibal  was  waging  war  in  Italy,  his  brother  Hasdrubal 
was  carrying  on  a  desperate  struggle  with  the  Roman  armies  in 
Spain.  At  length  he  determined  to  leave  the  conduct  of  the  war 
in  that  country  to  others,  and  go  to  the  relief  of  his  brother,  who 
was  sadly  in  need  of  aid.  Like  Pyrrhus,  Hannibal  had  been 
brought  to  realize  that  even  constant  victories  won  at  the  cost 
of  soldiers  that  could  not  be  replaced,  meant  final  defeat. 

Hasdrubal  followed  the  same  route  that  had  been  taken  by  his 
brother  Hannibal,  and  in  the  year  207  B.C.  descended  from  the 
Alps  upon  the  plains  of  Northern  Italy.  Thence  he  advanced 
southward,  while  Hannibal  moved  northward  from  Bruttium  to 
meet  him.  Rome  made  a  last  great  effort  to  prevent  the  junction 
of  the  armies  of  the  two  brothers.  At  the  river  Metaurus,  Has- 
drubal's  march  was  withstood  by  a  large  Roman  army.  Here  his 
forces  were  cut  to  pieces,  and  he  himself  was  slain  (207  B.C.). 
His  head  was  severed  from  his  body  and  sent  to  Hannibal.  Upon 
recognizing  the  features  of  his  brother,  Hannibal  exclaimed  sadly, 
"  Carthage,  I  see  thy  fate." 

War  in  Africa:  Battle  of  Zama.  —  The  defeat  and  death  of 
Hasdrubal  gave  a  different  aspect  to  the  war.  Hannibal  now 
drew  back  into  the  rocky  peninsula  of  Bruttium,  the  southernmost 
point  of  Italy.  There  he  faced  the  Romans  like  a  lion  at  bay. 
No  one  dared  attack  him.  It  was  resolved  to  carry  the  war  into 
Africa,  in  hopes  that  the  Carthaginians  would  be  forced  to  call 
their  great  commander  out  of  Italy  to  the  defence  of  Carthage. 
Publius  Cornelius  Scipio,  who  after  the  departure  of  Hasdrubal 
from  Spain  had  quickly  brought  the  peninsula  under  the  power  of 
Rome,  led  the  army  of  invasion.  He  had  not  been  long  in  Africa 
before  the  Carthaginian  Senate  sent  for  Hannibal  to  conduct  the 
war.  At  Zama,  not  far  from  Carthage,  the  hostile  armies  came 
face  to  face.     Fortune  had  deserted  Hannibal ;  he  was  fighting 


THE   CLOSE   OF  THE    WAR. 


265 


against  fate.  He  here  met  his  first  and  final  defeat  His  army, 
in  which  were  many  of  the  veterans  that  had  served  through  all 
the  Italian  campaigns,  was  almost  annihilated  (202  B.C.).  Scipio 
was  accorded  a  splendid  triumph  at  Rome,  and  given  the  surname 
Africanus  in  honor  of  his  achievements.1 


PUBLIUS    CORNELIUS    SCIPIO    (Africanus). 

The  Close  of  the  War.  —  Carthage  was  now  completely  ex- 
hausted, and  sued  for  peace.  Even  Hannibal  himself  could  no 
longer  counsel  war.  The  terms  of  the  treaty  were  much  severer 
than  those  imposed  upon  the  city  at  the  end  of  the  First  Punic 
War.  She  was  required  to  give  up  all  claims  to  Spain  and  the 
islands  of  the  Mediterranean ;  to  surrender  her  war  elephants,  and 
all  her  ships  of  war  save  ten  galleys ;  to  pay  an  indemnity  of  five 
thousand  talents  at  once,  and  two  hundred  and  fifty  talents  annu- 

1  Some  time  after  the  close  of  the  Second  Punic  War,  the  Romans,  per- 
suading themselves  that  Hannibal  was  preparing  Carthage  for  another  war, 
demanded  his  surrender  of  the  Carthaginians.  He  fled  to  Syria,  and  thence  to 
Asia  Minor,  where,  to  avoid  falling  into  the  hands  of  his  implacable  foes,  he 
committed  suicide  by  means  of  poison  (183  B.C.). 


266  THE  SECOND  PUNIC   WAR. 

ally  for  fifty  years  ;  and  not  to  engage  in  any  war  without  the  con- 
sent of  Rome.  Five  hundred  of  the  costly  Phoenician  war  galleys 
were  towed  out  of  the  harbor  of  Carthage  and  burned  in  the  sight 
of  the  citizens. 

Such  was  the  end  of  the  Second  Punic,  or  Hannibalic  War,  as 
called  by  the  Romans,  the  most  desperate  straggle  ever  main- 
tained by  rival  powers  for  empire. 


THE  BATTLE    OF  CYNOSCEPHALsE.  267 


CHAPTER   XXVI. 

THE  THIRD   PUNIC   WAR. 

(149-146  B.C.) 

Events  between  the  Second  and  the  Third  Punic  War. 

The  terms  imposed  upon  Carthage  at  the  end  of  the  Second 
Punic  War  left  Rome  mistress  of  the  Western  Mediterranean. 
During  the  fifty  eventful  years  that  elapsed  between  the  close  of 
that  struggle  and  the  breaking-out  of  the  last  Punic  war,  her  au- 
thority became  supreme  also  in  the  Eastern  seas.  In  a  preceding 
chapter  (see  p.  170),  while  narrating  the  fortunes  of  the  most  im- 
portant states  into  which  the  great  empire  of  Alexander  was  broken 
at  his  death,  we  followed  them  until  one  after  another  they  fell 
beneath  the  arms  of  Rome,  and  were  successively  absorbed  into 
her  growing  kingdom.  We  shall  therefore  speak  of  them  here 
only  in  the  briefest  manner,  simply  indicating  the  connection  of 
their  several  histories  with  the  series  of  events  which  mark  the 
advance  of  Rome  to  universal  empire. 

The  Battle  of  Cynoscephalae  (197  b.c).  —  During  the  Hanni- 
balic  War,  Philip  V.  (III.)  of  Macedonia  had  aided  the  Cartha- 
ginians, or  at  least  had  entered  into  an  alliance 
with  them.  He  was  now  troubling  the  Greek 
cities  which  were  under  the  protection  of 
Rome.  For  these  things  the  Roman  Senate 
determined  to  punish  him.  An  army  under 
Flamininus  was  sent  into  Greece,  and  on  the 
plains  of  Cynoscephalae,  in  Thessaly,  the  Roman  p 
legion  demonstrated  its  superiority  over  the  un- 
wieldy Macedonian  phalanx  by  subjecting  Philip  to  a  most  disas- 
trous defeat  (197  b.c).  The  king  was  forced  to  give  up  all  his 
conquests,  and  Rome  extended  her  protectorate  over  Greece. 


268 


THE    THIRD  PUNIC    WAR. 


The  Battle  of  Magnesia  (190  b.c).  —  Antiochus  the  Great  of 
Syria  had  at  this  time  not  only  overrun  all  Asia  Minor,  but  had 
crossed  the  Hellespont  into  Europe,  and  was  intent  upon  the 
conquest  of  Thrace  and  Greece.  Rome,  that  could  not  enter- 
tain the  idea  of  a  rival  empire  upon  the  southern  shores  of  the 
Mediterranean,  could  much  less  tolerate  the  establishment  in  the 
East  of  such  a  colossal  kingdom  as  the  ambition  of  Antiochus 
proposed  to  itself.  Just  as  soon  as  intelligence  was  carried  to 
Italy  that  the  Syrian  king  was  leading  his  army  into  Greece,  the 
legions  of  the  republic  were  set  in  motion.  Some  reverses  caused 
Antiochus  to  retreat  in  haste  across  the  Hellespont  into  Asia, 
whither  he  was  followed  by  the  Romans,  led  by  Scipio,  a  brother 
of  Africanus. 

At  Magnesia,  Antiochus  was  overthrown,  and  a  large  part  of  Asia 
Minor  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Romans.  Not  yet  prepared  to 
maintain  provinces  so  distant  from  the  Tiber,  the  Senate  conferred 
the  new  territory,  with  the  exception  of  Lycia  and  Caria,  which 
were  given  to  the  Rhodians,  upon  their  friend  and  ally  Eumenes, 
King  of  Pergamus  (see  p.  1 7 1 ) .  This  "  Kingdom  of  Asia,"  as  it  was 
called,  was  really  nothing  more  than  a  dependency  of  Rome,  and  its 
nominal  ruler  only  a  puppet-king  in  the  hands  of  the  Roman  Senate. 
Scipio  enjoyed  a  magnificent  triumph  at  Rome,  and,  in  accord- 
ance with  a  custom  that  had  now  become  popular  with  successful 
generals,  erected  a  memorial  of  his  deeds  in  his  name  by  assuming 
the  title  of  Asiaticus. 

The  Battle  of  Pydna  (168  b.c).  —  In  a  few  years  Macedonia, 
under  the  leadership  of  Perseus,  son  of 
Philip  V.,  was  again  in  arms  and  offering  de- 
fiance to  Rome  ;  but  in  the  year  168  B.C.  the 
Roman  consul  v^Emilius  Paulus  crushed  the 
Macedonian  power  forever  upon  the  mem- 
orable field  of  Pydna.  This  was  one  of 
the  decisive  battles  fought  by  the  Romans 
in  their  struggle  for  the  dominion  of  the 
perseus,  of  Macedonia,    world.    The  last  great  power  in  the  East 


DESTRUCTION  OF  CORINTH.  269 

was  here  broken.  The  Roman  Senate  was  henceforth  recognized 
by  the  whole  civilized  world  as  the  source  and  fountain  of  supreme 
political  wisdom  and  power.  We  shall  have  yet  to  record  many 
campaigns  of  the  Roman  legions ;  but  these  were  efforts  to  sup- 
press revolt  among  dependent  or  semi-vassal  states,  or  were  strug- 
gles with  barbarian  tribes  that  skirted  the  Roman  dominions. 

The  Destruction  of  Corinth  (146  b.c).  —  Barely  twenty  years 
had  passed  after  the  destruction  of  the  Macedonian  monarchy 
before  the  cities  and  states  that  formed  the  Achaean  League  (see 
p.  175)  were  goaded  to  revolt  by  the  injustice  of  their  Roman  pro- 
tectors. In  the  year  146  B.C.  the  consul  Mummius  signalized  the 
suppression  of  the  rebellion  by  the  complete  destruction  of  the 
brilliant  city  of  Corinth,  the  "eye  of  Hellas,"  as  the  ancient  poets 
were  fond  of  calling  it.  This  fair  capital,  the  most  beautiful  and 
renowned  of  all  the  cities  of  Greece  after  the  fall  of  Athens,  was 
sacked,  and  razed  to  the  ground.  Much  of  the  booty  was  sold  on 
the  spot  at  public  auction.  Numerous  works  of  art,  —  rare  paint- 
ings and  sculptures,  —  with  which  the  city  was  crowded,  were  car- 
ried off  to  Italy.  "  Never  before  or  after,"  says  Long,  "was such 
a  display  of  the  wonders  of  Grecian  art  carried  in  triumphal  pro- 
cession through  the  streets  of  Rome." 

The  Third  Punic  War. 

"Carthage  must  be  destroyed."  —  The  same  year  that  Rome 
destroyed  Corinth  (146  B.C.),  she  also  blotted  her  great  rival  Car- 
thage from  the  face  of  the  earth.  It  will  be  recalled  that  one  of 
the  conditions  imposed  upon  the  last-named  city  at  the  close  of 
the  Second  Punic  War  was  that  she  should,  under  ho  circum- 
stances, engage  in  any  war  without  the  permission  of  the  Roman 
Senate.  Taking  advantage  of  the  helpless  condition  of  Carthage, 
Masinissa,  King  of  Numidia,  began  to  make  depredations  upon 
her  territories.  She  appealed  to  Rome  for  protection.  The  en- 
voys sent  to  Africa  by  the  Senate  to  settle  the  dispute,  unfairly 
adjudged  every  case  in  favor  of  the  robber  Masinissa.  In  this  way 
Carthage  was  deprived  of  her  lands  and  towns. 


270  THE    THIRD  PUNIC    WAR. 

Chief  of  one  of  the  embassies  sent  out  was  Marcus  Cato  the 
Censor.  When  he  saw  the  prosperity  of  Carthage,  —  her  immense 
trade,  which  crowded  her  harbor  with  ships,  and  the  country  for 
miles  back  of  the  city  a  beautiful  landscape  of  gardens  and  villas, 
—  he  was  amazed  at  the  growing  power  and  wealth  of  the  city, 
and  returned  home  convinced  that  the  safety  of  Rome  demanded 
the  destruction  of  her  rival.  Never  afterwards  did  he  address  the 
Romans,  no  matter  upon  what  subject,  but  he  always  ended  with 
the  words,  "Carthage  must  be  destroyed"  (delenda  est  Carthago). 

Roman  Perfidy.  —  A  pretext  for  the  accomplishment  of  the 
hateful  work  was  not  long  wanting.  In  150  b.c.  the  Carthagin- 
ians, when  Masinissa  made  another  attack  upon  their  territory, 
instead  of  calling  upon  Rome,  from  which  source  the  past  had 
convinced  them  they  could  hope  for  neither  aid  nor  justice, 
gathered  an  army,  and  resolved  to  defend  themselves.  Their 
forces,  however,  were  defeated  by  the  Numidians,  and  sent  be- 
neath the  yoke. 

In  entering  upon  this  war  without  the  consent  of  Rome,  Car- 
thage had  broken  the  conditions  of  the  last  treaty.  The  Cartha- 
ginian Senate,  in  great  anxiety,  now  sent  an  embassy  to  Italy  to 
offer  any  reparation  the  Romans  might  demand.  They  were  told 
that  if  they  would  give  three  hundred  hostages,  members  of  the 
noblest  Carthaginian  families,  the  independence  of  their  city 
should  be  respected.  They  eagerly  complied  with  this  demand. 
But  no  sooner  were  these  in  the  hands  of  the  Romans  than  the 
consular  armies,  numbering  eighty  thousand  men,  secured  against 
attack  by  the  hostages  so  perfidiously  drawn  from  the  Carthagin- 
ians, crossed  from  Sicily  into  Africa,  and  disembarked  at  Utica, 
only  ten  miles  from  Carthage. 

The  Carthaginians  were  now  commanded  to  give  up  all  their 
arms  ;  still  hoping  to  win  their  enemy  to  clemency,  they  complied 
with  this  demand  also.  Then  the  consuls  made  known  the  final 
decree  of  the  Roman  Senate  — "  That  Carthage  must  be  de- 
stroyed, but  that  the  inhabitants  might  build  a  new  city,  provided 
it  were  located  ten  miles  from  the  coast." 


PREPARATIONS  FOR  DEFENCE.  271 

When  this  resolution  of  the  Senate  was  announced  to  the  Car- 
thaginians, and  they  realized  the  baseness  and  perfidy  of  their 
enemy,  a  cry  of  indignation  and  despair  burst  from  the  be- 
trayed city. 

The  Carthaginians  prepare  to  defend  their  City.  —  It  was  re- 
solved to  resist  to  the  bitter  end  the  execution  of  the  cruel  decree. 
The  gates  of  the  city  were  closed.  Me/i,  women,  and  children 
set  to  work  and  labored  day  and  night  manufacturing  arms.  The 
entire  city  was  converted  into  one  great  workshop.  The  utensils 
of  the  home  and  the  sacred  vessels  of  the  temples,  statues,  and 
vases  were  melted  down  for  weapons.  Material  was  torn  from 
the  buildings  of  the  city  for  the  construction  of  military  engines. 
The  women  cut  off  their  hair  and  braided  it  into  strings  for  the 
catapults.  By  such  labor,  and  through  such  means,  the  city  was 
soon  put  in  a  state  to  withstand  a  siege. 

When  the  Romans  advanced  to  take  possession  of  the  place, 
they  were  astonished  to  find  the  people  they  had  just  treacher- 
ously disarmed,  with  weapons  in  their  hands,  manning  the  walls  of 
their  capital,  and  ready  to  bid  them  defiance. 

The  Destruction  of  Carthage.  —  It  is  impossible  for  us  here  to 
give  the  circumstances  of  the  siege  of  Carthage.  For  four  years 
the  city  held  out  against  the  Roman  army.  At  length  the  consul 
Scipio  yEmilianus  succeeded  in  taking  it  by  storm.  When  resist- 
ance ceased,  only  50,000  men,  women,  and  children,  out  of  a 
population  of  700,000,  remained  to  be  made  prisoners.  The  city 
was  fired,  and  for  seventeen  days  the  space  within  the  walls  was  a 
sea  of  flames.  Every  trace  of  building  which  the  fire  could  not 
destroy  was  levelled,  a  plough  was  driven  over  the  site,  and  a 
dreadful  curse  invoked  upon  any  one  who  should  dare  attempt  to 
rebuild  the  city. 

Such  was  the  hard  fate  of  Carthage.  It  is  said  that  Scipio,  as 
he  gazed  upon  the  smouldering  ruins,  seemed  to  read  in  them  the 
fate  of  Rome,  and,  bursting  into  tears,  sadly  repeated  the  lines  of 
Homer : 


272  THE    THIRD   PUNIC    WAR. 

"  The  day  shall  come  in  which  our  sacred  Troy, 
And  Priam,  and  the  people  over  whom 
Spear-bearing  Priam  rules,  shall  perish  all." 

The  Carthaginian  territory  in  Africa  was  made  into  a  Roman 
province,  with  Utica  as  the  leading  city ;  and  Roman  civilization 
was  spread  rapidly,  by  means  of  traders  and  settlers,  throughout 
the  regions  that  lie  between  the  ranges  of  the  Atlas  and  the  sea. 

War  in  Spain. 

Siege  of  Numantia.  —  It  is  fitting  that  the  same  chapter  which 
narrates  the  destruction  of  Corinth  in  Greece,  and  the  blotting- 
out  of  Carthage  in  Africa,  should  tell  the  story  of  the  destruction 
of  Numantia  in  Spain. 

The  expulsion  of  the  Carthaginians  from  the  Spanish  peninsula 
really  gave  Rome  the  control  of  only  a  small  part  of  that  country. 
The  war-like  native  tribes  —  the  Celtiberians  and  Lusitanians  — 
of  the  North  and  the  West  were  ready  stubbornly  to  dispute  with 
the  new-comers  the  possession  of  the  soil. 

The  war  gathered  about  Numantia,  the  siege  of  which  was 
brought  to  a  close  by  Scipio  JEmilianus,  the  conqueror  of  Car- 
thage. Before  the  surrender  of  the  place,  almost  all  the  inhab- 
itants had  met  death,  either  in  defence  of  the  walls,  or  by 
deliberate  suicide.  The  miserable  remnant  which  the  ravages  of 
battle,  famine,  pestilence,  and  despair  had  left  alive  were  sold  into 
slavery,  and  the  city  was  levelled  to  the  ground  (133  B.C.). 

The  capture  of  Numantia  was  considered  quite  as  great  an 
achievement  as  the  taking  of  Carthage.  Scipio  celebrated  an- 
other triumph  at  Rome,  and  to  his  surname  Africanus,  which  he 
had  received  for  his  achievements  in  Africa,  added  that  of  Numan- 
tinus.  Spain  became  a  favorite  resort  of  Roman  merchants,  and 
many  colonies  were  established  in  different  parts  of  the  country. 
As  a  result  of  this  great  influx  of  Italians,  the  laws,  manners,  cus- 
toms, language,  and  religion  of  the  conquerors  were  introduced 
everywhere,  and  the  peninsula  became  rapidly  Romanized. 


THE   SERVILE    WAR   IN  ITALY.  273 


CHAPTER    XXVII. 

THE  LAST  CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

(133-131   B.C.) 

We  have  now  traced  the  growth  of  the  power  of  republican 
Rome,  as  through  two  centuries  and  more  of  conquest  she  has 
extended  her  authority,  first  throughout  Italy,  and  then  over  almost 
all  the  countries  that  border  upon  the  Mediterranean.  It  must  be 
our  less  pleasant  task  now  to  follow  the  declining  fortunes  of  the 
republic  through  the  last  century  of  its  existence.  We  shall  here 
learn  that  wars  waged  for  spoils  and  dominion  are  in  the  end  more 
ruinous,  if  possible,  to  the  conqueror  than  to  the  conquered. 

The  Servile  War  in  Sicily  (134-132  b.c).  —  With  the  open- 
ing of  this  period  we  find  a  terrible  struggle  going  on  in  Sicily 
between  masters  and  slaves  —  or  what  is  known  as  "  The  First  Ser- 
vile War."  The  condition  of  affairs  in  that  island  was  the  legiti- 
mate result  of  the  Roman  system  of  slavery.  The  captives  taken 
in  war  were  usually  sold  into  servitude.  The  great  number  of 
prisoners  furnished  by  the  numerous  conquests  of  the  Romans 
caused  slaves  to  become  a  drug  in  the  slave-markets  of  the  Ro- 
man world.  They  were  so  cheap  that  masters  found  it  more 
profitable  to  wear  their  slaves  out  by  a  few  years  of  unmercifully 
hard  labor,  and  then  to  buy  others,  than  to  preserve  their  lives  for 
a  longer  period  by  more  humane  treatment.  In  case  of  sickness, 
they  were  left  to  die  without  attention,  as  the  expense  of  nursing 
exceeded  the  cost  of  new  purchases.  Some  Sicilian  estates  were 
worked  by  as  many  as  20,000  slaves.  That  each  owner  might 
know  his  own,  the  poor  creatures  were  branded  like  cattle.  What 
makes  all  this  the  more  revolting  is  the  fact  that  many  of  these 
slaves  were  in  ever)'  way  the  peers  of  their  owners,  and  often  were 


274  LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

their  superiors.  The  fortunes  of  war  alone  had  made  one  servant 
and  the  other  master. 

The  wretched  condition  of  these  slaves  and  the  cruelty  of  their 
masters  at  last  drove  them  to  revolt.  The  insurrection  spread 
throughout  the  island,  until  200,000  slaves  were  in  arms,  and  in 
possession  of  many  of  the  strongholds  of  the  country.  They  de- 
feated four  Roman  armies  sent  against  them,  and  for  three  years 
defied  the  power  of  Rome.  Finally,  however,  in  the  year  132  B.C., 
the  revolt  was  crushed,  and  peace  wag  restored  to  the  distracted 
island.1 

The  Public  Lands.  —  In  Italy  itself  affairs  were  in  a  scarcely 
less  wretched  condition  than  in  Sicily.  When  the  different  states 
of  the  peninsula  were  subjugated,  large  portions  of  the  conquered 
territory  had  become  public  land  imager  publicus)  ;  for  upon  the 
subjugation  of  a  state  Rome  never  left  to  the  conquered  people 
more  than  two-thirds  of  their  lands,  and  often  not  so  much  as 
this.  The  land  appropriated  was  disposed  of  at  public  sale,  leased 
at  low  rentals,  allotted  to  discharged  soldiers,  or  allowed  to  lie 
unused.2 

Now,  it  had  happened  that,  in  various  ways,  the  greater  part  of  the 
public  lands  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  wealthy.  They  alone 
had  the  capital  necessary  to  stock  and  work  them  to  advantage ; 
hence  the  possessions  of  the  small  proprietors  were  gradually 
absorbed  by  the  large  landholders.  These  great  proprietors,  also, 
disregarding  a  law  which  forbade  any  person  to  hold  more  than 
five  hundred  jugera  of  land,  held  many  times  that  amount.  Al- 
most all  the  lands  of  Italy,  about  the  beginning  of  the  first  century 
B.C.,  are  said  to  have  been  held  by  not  more  than  two  thousand 

1  In  the  year  102  B.C.  another  insurrection  of  the  slaves  broke  out  in  the 
island,  which  it  required  three  years  to  quell.  This  last  revolt  is  known  as 
"  The  Second  Servile  War." 

2  These  land  matters  may  be  made  plain  by  a  reference  to  the  public  lands 
of  the  United  States.  The  troubles  in  Ireland  between  the  land-owners  and 
their  tenants  will  also  serve  to  illustrate  the  agrarian  disturbances  in  ancient 
Rome. 


THE  PUBLIC  LANDS.  275 

persons ;  for  the  large  proprietors,  besides  the  lands  they  had  se- 
cured by  purchase  from  the  government,  or  had  wrested  from  the 
smaller  farmers,  claimed  enormous  tracts  to  which  they  had  only 
a  squatter's  title.  So  long  had  they  been  left  in  undisturbed 
possession  of  these  government  lands  that  they  had  come  to  look 
upon  them  as  absolutely  their  own.  In  many  cases,  feeling  secure 
through  great  lapse  of  time,  —  the  lands  having  been  handed  down 
through  many  generations,  —  the  owners  had  expended  large  sums 
in  their  improvement,  and  now  resisted  as  very  unjust  every  effort 
to  dispossess  them  of  their  hereditary  estates.  Money-lenders, 
too,  had,  in  many  instances,  made  loans  upon  these  lands,  and 
they  naturally  sided  with  the  owners  in  their  opposition  to  all 
efforts  to  disturb  the  titles. 

These  wealthy  "  possessors  "  employed  slave  rather  than  free 
labor,  as  they  found  it  more  profitable ;  and  so  the  poorer 
Romans,  left  without  employment,  crowded  into  the  cities,  es- 
pecially congregating  at  Rome,  where  they  lived  in  vicious  in- 
dolence. The  proprietors  also  found  it  to  their  interest  to  raise 
stock  rather  than  to  cultivate  the  soil.  All  Italy  became  a  great 
sheep -pasture. 

Thus,  largely  through  the  workings  of  the  public  land  system, 
the  Roman  people  had  become  divided  into  two  great  classes, 
which  are  variously  designated  as  the  Rich  and  the  Poor,  the  Pos- 
sessors and  the  Non-Possessors,  the  Optimates  (the  "Best "),  and 
the  Populares  (the  "People").  We  hear  nothing  more  of  patri- 
cians and  plebeians.  As  one  expresses  it,  "  Rome  had  become  a 
commonwealth  of  millionaires  and  beggars." 

For  many  years  before  and  after  the  period  at  which  we  have 
now  arrived,  a  bitter  struggle  was  carried  on  between  these  two 
classes ;  just  such  a  contest  as  we  have  seen  waged  between  the 
nobility  and  the  commonalty  in  the  earlier  history  of  Rome.  The 
most  instructive  portion  of  the  story  of  the  Roman  republic  is 
found  in  the  records  of  this  later  struggle.  The  misery  of  the 
great  masses  naturally  led  to  constant  agitation  at  the  capital. 
Popular  leaders  introduced  bill  after  bill  into  the  Senate,  and 


276         LAST  CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

brought  measure  after  measure  before  the  assemblies  of  the  peo- 
ple, all  aiming  at  the  redistribution  of  the  public  lands  and  the 
correction  of  existing  abuses. 

The  Reforms  of  the  Gracchi.  —  The  most  noted  champions  of 
the  cause  of  the  poorer  classes  against  the  rich  and  powerful  were 
Tiberius  and  Caius  Gracchus.  These  reformers  are  reckoned 
among  the  most  popular  orators  that  Rome  ever  produced. 
They  eloquently  voiced  the  wrongs  of  the  people.  Said  Tiberius, 
"  You  are  called  '  lords  of  the  earth '  without  possessing  a  single 
clod  to  call  your  own."  The  people  made  him  tribune;  and  in 
that  position  he  secured  the  passage  of  a  law  for  the  redistribution 
of  the  public  lands,  which  gave  some  relief.  It  took  away  from 
Possessors  without  sons  all  the  land  they  held  over  five  hundred 
jugera;  Possessors  with  one  son  might  hold  seven  hundred  and 
fifty  jugera,  and  those  with  two  sons  one  thousand. 

At  the  end  of  his  term  of  office,  Tiberius  stood  a  second  time 
for  the  tribunate.  The  nobles  combined  to  defeat  him.  Fore- 
seeing that  he  would  not  be  re-elected,  Tiberius  resolved  to  use 
force  upon  the  day  of  voting.  His  partisans  were  overpowered, 
and  he  and  three  hundred  of  his  followers  were  killed  in  the 
Forum,  and  their  bodies  thrown  into  the  Tiber  (133  B.C.).  This 
was  the  first  time  that  the  Roman  Forum  had  witnessed  such  a 
scene  of  violence  and  crime. 

Caius  Gracchus,  the  younger  brother  of  Tiberius,  now  assumed 
the  position  made  vacant  by  the  death  of  Tiberius.  It  is  related 
that  Caius  had  a  dream  in  which  the  spirit  of  his  brother  seemed 
to  address  him  thus  :  "  Caius,  why  do  you  linger  ?  There  is  no 
escape  :  one  life  for  both  of  us,  and  one  death  in  defence  of  the 
people,  is  our  fate."  The  dream  came  true.  Caius  was  chosen 
tribune  in  123  B.C.  He  secured  the  passage  of  grain-laws  which 
provided  that  grain  should  be  sold  to  the  poor  from  public  grana- 
ries, at  half  its  value  or  less.  This  was  a  very  unwise  and  perni- 
cious measure.  It  was  not  long  before  grain  was  distributed  free 
to  all  applicants ;  and  a  considerable  portion  of  the  population  of 
the  capital  were  living  in  vicious  indolence  and  feeding  at  the 
public  crib. 


THE    WAR    WITH  JUGURTHA.  277 

Caius  proposed  other  measures  in  the  interest  of  the  people, 
which  were  bitterly  opposed  by  the  Optimates ;  and  the  two  orders 
at  last  came  into  collision.  Caius  sought  death  by  a  friendly  sword 
(121  B.C.),  and  three  thousand  of  his  adherents  were  massacred. 
The  consul  offered  for  the  head  of  Caius  its  weight  in  gold. 
••  This  is  the  first  instance  in  Roman  history  of  head-money  being 
offered  and  paid,  but  it  was  not  the  last "  (Long). 

The  people  ever  regarded  the  Gracchi  as  martyrs  to  their  cause, 
and  their  memory  was  preserved  by  statues  in  the  public  square. 
To  Cornelia,  their  mother,  a  monument  was  erected,  simply  bear- 
ing the  inscription,  "The  Mother  of  the  Gracchi." 

The  War  with  Jugurtha  (111-106  B.C.).  —  After  the  death 
of  the  Gracchi  there  seemed  no  one  left  to  resist  the  heartless 
oppressions  and  to  denounce  the  scandalous  extravagances  of  the 
aristocratic  party.  Many  of  the  laws  of  the  Gracchi  respecting 
the  public  lands  were  annulled.  Italy  fell  again  into  the  hands  of 
a  few  over-rich  land-owners.  The  provinces  were  plundered  by 
the  Roman  governors,  who  squandered  their  ill-gotten  wealth  at 
the  capital.  The  votes  of  senators  and  the  decisions  of  judges, 
the  offices  at  Rome  and  the  places  in  the  provinces  —  everything 
pertaining  to  the  government  had  its  price,  and  was  bought  and 
sold  like  merchandise.  Affairs  in  Africa  at  this  time  illustrate  how 
Roman  virtue  and  integrity  had  declined  since  Fabricius  indig- 
nantly refused  the  gold  of  Pyrrhus. 

Jugurtha,  king  of  Numidia,  had  seized  all  that  country,  having 
put  to  death  the  rightful  rulers  of  different  provinces  of  the  region, 
who  had  been  confirmed  in  their  possessions  by  the  Romans  at 
the  close  of  the  Punic  wars.  Commissioners  sent  from  Rome  to 
look  into  the  matter  were  bribed  by  Jugurtha.  Even  the  consul 
Ikstia,  who  had  been  sent  into  Africa  with  an  army  to  punish  the 
insolent  usurper,  sold  himself  to  the  robber.  An  investigation  was 
ordered ;  but  many  prominent  officials  at  Rome  were  implicated 
in  the  offences,  and  the  matter  was  hushed  up  with  money.  The 
venality  of  the  Romans  disgusted  even  Jugurtha,  who  exclaimed, 
"O  venal  city,  thou  wouldst  sell  thyself  if  thou  couldst  find  a 
purchaser ! " 


278  LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

In  the  year  106  b.c.  the  war  against  Jugurtha  was  brought  to  a 
close  by  Caius  Marius,  a  man  who  had  risen  to  the  consulship 
from  the  lowest  ranks  of  the  people.  Under  him  fought  a  young 
nobleman  named  Sulla,  of  whom  we  shall  hear  much  hereafter. 
Marius  celebrated  a  grand  triumph  at  Rome.  Jugurtha,  after  hav- 
ing graced  the  triumphal  procession,  was  thrown  into  the  Mamer- 
tine  dungeon,  beneath  the  Capitoline,  where  he  died  of  starvation. 

Invasion  of  the  Cimbri  and  Teutones.  — The  war  was  not  yet 
ended  in  Africa  before  terrible  tidings  came  to  Rome  from  the 
north.  Two  mighty  nations  of  "  horrible  barbarians,"  three  hun- 
dred thousand  strong  in  fighting- men,  coming  whence  no  one 
could  tell,  had  invaded,  and  were  now  desolating,  the  Roman 
provinces  of  Gaul,  and  might  any  moment  cross  the  Alps  and 
pour  down  into  Italy. 

The  mysterious  invaders  proved  to  be  two  Germanic  tribes,  the 
Teutones  and  Cimbri,  the  vanguard  of  that  great  German  migra- 
tion which  was  destined  to  change  the  face  and  history  of  Europe. 
These  intruders  were  seeking  new  homes.  They  carried  with 
them,  in  rude  wagons,  all  their  property,  their  wives,  and  their 
children.  The  Celtic  tribes  of  Gaul  were  no  match  for  the  new- 
comers, and  fled  before  them  as  they  advanced.  Several  Roman 
armies  beyond  the  Alps  were  cut  to  pieces.  The  terror  at  Rome 
was  only  equalled  by  that  occasioned  by  the  invasion  of  the  Gauls 
two  centuries  before.  The  Gauls  were  terrible  enough ;  but  now 
the  conquerors  of  the  Gauls  were  coming. 

Marius,  the  conqueror  of  Jugurtha,  was  looked  to  by  all  as  the 
only  man  who  could  save  the  state  in  this  crisis.  Accompanied 
by  Sulla  as  one  of  his  most  skilful  lieutenants,  Marius  hastened 
into  Northern  Italy.  The  barbarians  had  divided  into  two  bands. 
The  Cimbri  were  to  cross  the  Eastern  Alps,  and  join  in  the  valley 
of  the  Po  the  Teutones,  who  were  to  force  the  defiles  of  the 
Western,  or  Maritime  Alps.  Marius  determined  to  prevent  the 
union  of  the  barbarians,  and  to  crush  each  band  separately. 

Anticipating  the  march  of  the  Teutones,  he  hurried  over  the 
Alps  into  Gaul,  and  falling  upon  them  at  a  favorable  moment  (at 


THE   SOCIAL    WAR.  279 

Aquae  Sextiae,  not  far  from  Marseilles,  102  B.C.),  almost  annihilated 
the  entire  host.  Two  hundred  thousand  barbarians  are  said  to 
have  been  slain.  Marius  now  recrossed  the  Alps,  and,  after  visit- 
ing Rome,  hastened  to  meet  the  Cimbri,  who  were  entering  the 
northeastern  corner  of  Italy.  He  was  not  a  day  too  soon.  Al- 
ready the  barbarians  had  defeated  the  Roman  army  under  the 
nobleman  Catulus,  and  were  ravaging  the  rich  plains  of  the  To. 
The  Cimbri,  unconscious  of  the  fate  of  the  Teutones,  sent  an  em- 
bassy to  Marius,  to  demand  that  they  and  their  kinsmen  should  be 
given  lands  in  Italy.  Marius  sent  back  in  reply,  "  The  Teutones 
have  got  all  the  land  they  need  on  the  other  side  of  the  Alps." 
The  devoted  Cimbri  were  soon  to  have  all  they  needed  on  this  side. 

A  terrible  battle  almost  immediately  followed  at  Vercellae  (101 
B.C.).  The  barbarians  were  drawn  up  in  an  enormous  hollow 
square,  the  men  forming  the  outer  ranks  being  fastened  together 
with  chains,  to  prevent  the  lines  being  broken.  This  proved  their 
ruin.  More  than  100,000  were  killed  and  60,000  taken  prisoners 
to  be  sold  as  slaves  in  the  Roman  markets.  Marius  was  hailed  as 
the  "  Saviour  of  his  Country." 

"  The  forlorn-hope  of  the  German  migration  had  performed  its 
duty  1  the  homeless  people  of  the  Cimbri  and  their  comrades 
were  no  more"  (Mommsen).  Their  kinsmen  yet  behind  the 
Danube  and  the  Rhine  were  destined  to  exact  a  terrible  revenge 
for  their  slaughter. 

The  Social,  or  Marsic  War  (91-89  b.c).  —  Scarcely  was  the 
danger  of  the  barbarian  invasion  past,  before  Rome  was  threatened 
by  another  and  greater  evil  arising  within  her  own  borders.  At 
this  time  all  the  free  inhabitants  of  Italy  were  embraced  in  three 
classes,  —  Rottian  citizens,  Latins,  and  Italian  allies.  The  Roman 
citizens  included  the  inhabitants  of  the  capital  and  of  the  various 
Roman  colonies  planted  in  different  parts  of  the  peninsula  (see  p. 
246,  note),  besides  the  people  of  a  number  of  towns  called  muni- 
cipia;  the  Latins  were  the  inhabitants  of  the  Latin  colonies  (see 
]».  246,  note)  ;  the  Italian  allies  (soeif)  included  the  various  subju- 
gated races  of  Italy. 


280  LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

The  Social,  or  Marsic  War  (as  it  is  often  called  on  account  of 
the  prominent  part  taken  in  the  insurrection  by  the  warlike  Mar- 
sians)  was  a  struggle  that  arose  from  the  demands  of  the  Italian 
allies  for  the  privileges  of  Roman  citizenship,  from  which  they 
were  wholly  excluded.  Their  demands  were  stubbornly  resisted 
by  both  the  aristocratic  and  the  popular  party  at  Rome.  Some, 
however,  recognized  the  justice  of  these  claims  of  the  Italians. 
The  tribune  Livius  Drusus  championed  their  cause,  but  he  was 
killed  by  an  assassin.  The  Italians  now  flew  to  arms.  They 
determined  upon  the  establishment  of  a  rival  state.  A  town 
called  Corfinium,  among  the  Apennines,  was  chosen  as  the  capital 
of  the  new  republic,  and  its  name  changed  to  Italica.  Thus,  in 
a  single  day,  almost  all  Italy  south  of  the  Rubicon  was  lost  to 
Rome.  The  Etrurians,  the  Umbrians,  the  Campanians,  the  Latins, 
and  some  of  the  Greek  cities  were  the  only 
states  that  remained  faithful. 

The  greatness  of  the  danger  aroused  all 
the    old    Roman   courage   and    patriotism. 
Aristocrats    and    democrats    hushed    their 
quarrels,  and   fought   bravely  side  by  side 
confederacy.  for   the    endangered   life   of  the   republic. 

(The  Sabellian  Bull  goring  the     Thg   war  lagted    three  ^       Finally  Rome 

Roman  Wolf.)  J  J 

prudently  extended  the  right  of  suffrage  to 
the  Latins,  Etruscans,  and  Umbrians,  who  had  so  far  remained 
true  to  her,  but  now  began  to  show  signs  of  wavering  in  their 
loyalty.  Shortly  afterwards  she  offered  the  same  to  all  Italians 
who  should  lay  down  their  arms  within  sixty  days.  This  tardy 
concession  to  the  just  demands  of  the  Italians  virtually  ended 
the  war.  It  had  been  extremely  disastrous  to  the  republic. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives  had  been  lost,  many  towns 
had  been  depopulated,  and  vast  tracts  of  the  country  made  des- 
olate by  those  ravages  that  never  fail  to  characterize  civil  conten- 
tions. 

In  after-years,  under  the  empire,  the  rights  of  Roman  citizen- 
ship, which  the  most  of  the  Italians  had  now  so  hardly  won,  were 


WAR   OF  MARIUS  AND  SULLA.  281 

extended  to  all  the  free  inhabitants  of  the  various  provinces, 
beyond  the  confines  of  Italy  (see  p.  329). 

The  Civil  War  of  Marius  and  Sulla. — The  Social  War  was 
not  yet  ended  when  a  formidable  enemy  appeared  in  the  East. 
Mithridates  the  Great,  king  of  Pontus  (see  p.  170,  note),  taking 
advantage  of  the  distracted  condition  of  the  republic,  had  en- 
croached upon  the  Roman  provinces  in  Asia  Minor,  and  had 
caused  a  general  massacre  of  the  Italian  traders  and  residents  in 
that  country.  The  number  of  victims  of  this  wholesale  slaughter 
has  been  variously  estimated  at  from  80,000  to  150,000.  The 
Roman  Senate  instantly  declared  war. 

A  contest  straightway  arose  between  Marius  and  Sulla  for  the 
command  of  the  forces.  The  sword  settled  the  dispute.  Sulla, 
at  the  head  of  the  legions  he  commanded,  marched  upon  Rome, 
entered  the  gates,  and  "  for  the  first  time  in  the  annals  of  the  city 
a  Roman  army  encamped  within  the  walls."  The  party  of  Marius 
was  defeated,  and  he  and  ten  of  his  companions  were  proscribed. 
Marius  escaped  and  fled  to  Africa ;  Sulla 
embarked  with  the  legions  to  meet  Mith- 
ridates in  the  East  (87  B.C.). 

The  Wanderings  of  Marius :  His  Re- 
turn to  Italy.  —  Leaving  Sulla  to  carry 
on  the  Mithridatic  War,  we  must  first 
follow  the  fortunes  of  the  outlawed  Ma- 
rius. The  ship  in  which  he  embarked 
for  Africa  was  driven  back  upon  the 
Italian  coast  at  Circeii,  and  he  was  cap- 
tured. A  Cimbrian  slave  was  sent  to 
despatch  him  in  prison.  The  cell  where 
Marius  lay  was  dark,  and  the  eyes  of  the 
old  soldier  "seemed  to  flash  fire."     As 

the  slave  advanced,  Marius  shouted,  "  Man,  do  you  dare  to  kill 
Caius  Marius?"  The  frightened  slave  dropped  his  sword,  and 
fled  from  the  chamber,  half  dead  with  fear. 

A  better  feeling  now  took  possession  of  the  captors  of  Marius, 


282  LAST   CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

and  they  resolved  that  the  blood  of  the  "  Saviour  of  Italy  "  should 
not  be  upon  their  hands.  They  put  him  aboard  a  vessel,  which 
bore  him  and  his  friends  to  an  island  just  off  the  coast  of  Africa. 
When  he  attempted  to  set  foot  upon  the  mainland  near  Carthage, 
Sextius,  the  Roman  governor  of  the  province,  sent  a  messenger  to 
forbid  him  to  land.  The  legend  says  that  the  old  general,  almost 
choking  with  indignation,  only  answered,  "  Go,  tell  your  master, 
that  you  have  seen  Marius  a  fugitive  sitting  amidst  the  rums  of 
Carthage." 

A  successful  move  of  his  friends  at  Rome  brought  Marius  back 
to  the  capital.  He  now  took  a  terrible  revenge  upon  his  enemies. 
The  consul  Octavius  was  assassinated,  and  his  head  set  up  in  front 
of  the  Rostrum.  Never  before  had  such  a  thing  been  seen  at 
Rome  —  a  consul's  head  exposed  to  the  public  gaze.  The  sena- 
tors, equestrians,  and  leaders  of  the  Optimate  party  fled  from  the 
capital.  For  five  days  and  nights  a  merciless  slaughter  was  kept 
up.  The  life  of  every  man  in  the  capital  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
revengeful  Marius.  If  he  refused  to  return  the  greeting  of  any 
citizen,  that  sealed  his  fate  :  he  was  instantly  despatched  by  the 
soldiers  who  awaited  the  dictator's  nod.  The  bodies  of  the  vic- 
tims lay  unburied  in  the  streets.  Sulla's  house  was  torn  down,  and 
he  himself  declared  a  public  enemy. 

Rumors  were  now  spread  that  Sulla,  having  overthrown  Mithri- 
dates,  was  about  to  set  out  on  his  return  with  his  victorious  legions. 
He  would  surely  exact  speedy  and  terrible  vengeance.  Marius, 
old  and  enfeebled  by  the  hardships  of  many  campaigns,  seemed 
to  shrink  from  again  facing  his  hated  rival.  He  plunged  into  dis- 
sipation to  drown  his  remorse  and  gloomy  forebodings,  and  died 
in  his  seventy-first  year  (86  B.C.). 

Sulla  and  the  Mithridatic  War.  —  When  Sulla  left  Italy  with 
his  legions  for  the  East,  he  knew  very  well  that  his  enemies  would 
have  their  own  way  in  Italy  during  his  absence  ;  but  he  also  knew 
that,  if  successful  in  his  campaign  against  Mithridates,  he  could 
easily  regain  Italy,  and  wrest  the  government  from  the  hands  of 
the  Marian  party. 


Tr 


5 


j<&r^s> 


THE  ROMAN  DOMINIONS 

at  the  end  of  the 

MITHRIDATIC  WAR. 

B.  C.  64. 


THE  PROSCRIPTIONS   OF  SULLA. 


283 


SULLA. 


We  can  here  take  space  to  give  simply  the  results  of  Sulla's 
campaigns  in  the  East.  After  driving  the  army  of  Mithridates  out 
of  Greece,  Sulla  crossed  the  Hellespont,  and  forced  the  king  to 
sue  for  peace.  He  gave  up  his  conquered  territory,  surrendered 
his  war  ships,  and  paid  a  large  indemnity  to 
cover  the  expenses  of  the  war. 

With  the  Mithridatic  War  ended,  Sulla 
wrote  to  the  Senate,  saying  that  he  was  now 
coming  to  take  vengeance  upon  the  Marian 
party,  —  his  own  and  the  republic's  foes. 

The  terror  and  consternation  produced  at 
Rome  by  this  letter  were  increased  by  the 
accidental  burning  of  the  Capitol.  The 
Sibylline  books,  which  held  the  secrets  of 
the  fate  of  Rome,  were  consumed.  Such  an 
event,  it  was  believed,  could  only  foreshadow 
the  most  direful  calamities  to  the  state. 

The  Proscriptions  of  Sulla. — The  returning  army  from  the 
East  landed  in  Italy.  With  his  veteran  legions  at  his  back,  Sulla 
marched  into  Rome  with  all  the  powers  of  a  dictator.  The  leaders 
of  the  Marian  party  were  proscribed,  rewards  were  offered  for 
their  heads,  and  their  property  was  confiscated.  Sulla  was  im- 
plored to  make  out  a  list  of  those  he  designed  to  put  to  death, 
that  those  he  intended  to  spare  might  be  relieved  of  the  terrible 
suspense  in  which  all  were  now  held.  He  made  out  a  list  of 
eighty,  which  was  attached  to  the  Rostrum.  The  people  mur- 
mured at  the  length  of  the  roll.  In  a  few  days  it  was  extended 
to  over  three  hundred,  and  grew  rapidly,  until  it  included  the 
names  of  thousands  of  the  best  citizens  of  Italy.  Hundreds  were 
murdered,  not  for  any  offence,  but  because  some  favorites  of  Sulla 
coveted  their  estates.  A  wealthy  noble  coming  into  the  Forum, 
and  reading  his  own  name  in  the  list  of  the  proscribed,  exclaimed, 
"  Alas  !  my  villa  has  proved  my  ruin."  The  infamous  Catiline,  by 
having  the  name  of  a  brother  placed  upon  the  fatal  roll,  secured 
his  property.     Julius  Caesar,  at  this  time  a  mere  boy  of  eighteen, 


284         LAST   CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

was  proscribed  on  account  of  his  relationship  to  Marius ;  but, 
upon  the  intercession  of  friends,  Sulla  spared  him :  as  he  did  so, 
however,  he  said  warningly,  and,  as  the  event  proved,  prophetically, 
"There  is  in  that  boy  many  a  Marius." 

Senators,  knights,  and  wealthy  land-owners  fell  by  hundreds 
and  by  thousands ;  but  the  poor  Italians  who  had  sided  with  the 
Marian  party  were  simply  slaughtered  by  tens  of  thousands.  Nor 
did  the  provinces  escape.  In  Sicily,  Spain,  and  Africa  the  enemies 
of  the  dictator  were  hunted  and  exterminated  like  noxious  animals. 
It  is  estimated  that  the  civil  war  of  Marius  and  Sulla  cost  the  re- 
public over  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  lives. 

When  Sulla  had  sated  his  revenge,  he  celebrated  a  splendid 
triumph  at  Rome,  and  the  Senate  enacted  a  law  declaring  all  that 
he  had  done  legal  and  right,  caused  to  be  erected  in  the  Forum  a 
gilded  equestrian  statue  of  the  dictator,  which  bore  the  legend, 
"To  Lucius  Cornelius  Sulla,  the  Commander  Beloved  by  Fortune," 
and  made  him  dictator  for  life.  Sulla  used  his  position  and  influ- 
ence in  recasting  the  constitution  in  the  interest  of  the  aristocratic 
party.  After  enjoying  the  unlimited  power  of  an  Asiatic  despot 
for  three  years,  he  suddenly  resigned  the  dictatorship,  and  retired 
to  his  villa  at  Puteoli,  where  he  gave  himself  up  to  the  grossest 
dissipations.     He  died  the  year  following  his  abdication  (78  B.C.). 


POMPEY   THE   GREAT.  285 


CHAPTER    XXVIII. 

THE    LAST   CENTURY  OF  THE   ROMAN    REPUBLIC    'concluded). 

(133-131    B.C.) 

Pompey  the  Great  in  Spain. — The  fires  of  the  Civil  War, 
though  quenched  in  Italy,  were  still  smouldering  in  Spain.  Serto- 
rius,  an  adherent  of  Marius,  had  there  stirred  up  the  martial  tribes 
of  Lusitania,  and  incited  a  general  revolt  against  the  power  of 
the  aristocratic  government  at  Rome.  Cnaeus  Pompey,  a  rising 
young  leader  of  the  oligarchy,  upon  whom  the  title  of  Great  had 
already  been  conferred  as  a  reward  for  crushing  the  Marian  party 
in  Sicily  and  Africa,  was  sent  into  Spain  to  perform  a  similar  ser- 
vice there. 

For  several  years  the  war  was  carried  on  with  varying  fortunes. 
At  times  the  power  of  Rome  in  the  peninsula  seemed  on  the  verge 
of  utter  extinction.  Finally,  the  brave  Sertorius  was  assassinated, 
and  then  the  whole  of  Spain  was  quickly  regained.  Pompey 
boasted  of  having  forced  the  gates  of  more  than  eight  hundred 
cities  in  Spain  and  Southern  Gaul.  Throughout  all  the  conquered 
regions  he  established  military  colonies,  and  reorganized  the  local 
governments,  putting  in  power  those  who  would  be,  not  only 
friends  and  allies  of  the  Roman  state,  but  also  his  own  personal 
adherents.  How  he  used  these  men  as  instruments  of  his  ambi- 
tion, we  shall  learn  a  little  later. 

Spartacus :  War  of  the  Gladiators.  —  While  Pompey  was  sub- 
duing the  Marian  faction  in  Spain,  a  new  danger  broke  out  in  the 
midst  of  Italy.  Gladiatorial  combats  had  become,  at  this  time, 
the  favorite  sport  of  the  amphitheatre.  At  Capua  was  a  sort  of 
training-school,  from  which  skilled  fighters  were  hired  out  for  pub- 
lic or  private  entertainments.  In  this  seminary  was  a  Thracian 
slave,  known  by  the  name  of  Spartacus,  who  incited  his  compan- 


286         LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE   ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

ions  to  revolt.  The  insurgents  fled  to  the  crater  of  Vesuvius,  and 
made  that  their  stronghold.  There  they  were  joined  by  gladiators 
from  other  schools,  and  by  slaves  and  discontented  men  from 
every  quarter.  Some  slight  successes  enabled  them  to  arm  them- 
selves with  the  weapons  of  their  enemies.  Their  number  at  length 
increased  to  one  hundred  thousand  men.  For*three  years  they 
defied  the  power  of  Rome,  and  even  gained  control  of  the  larger 
part  of  Southern  Italy.  Four  Roman  armies  sent  against  them 
were  cut  to  pieces.  But  at  length  Spartacus  himself  was  slain,  and 
the  insurgents  were  crushed. 

The  rebellion  was  punished  with  Roman  severity.  The  slaves 
that  had  taken  part  in  the  revolt  were  hunted  through  the  moun- 
tains and  forests,  and  exterminated  like  dangerous  beasts.  The 
Appian  Way  was  lined  with  six  thousand  crosses,  bearing  aloft  as 
many  bodies  —  a  terrible  warning  of  the  fate  awaiting  slaves  that 
should  dare  to  strike  for  freedom. 

The  Abuses  of  Verres.  —  Terrible  as  was  the  state  of  society  in 
Italy,  still  worse  was  the  condition  of  affairs  outside  the  peninsula. 
At  first  the  rule  of  the  Roman  governors  in  the  provinces,  though 
severe,  was  honest  and  prudent.  But  during  the  period  of  profli- 
gacy and  corruption  upon  which  we  have  now  entered,  the  admin- 
istration of  these  foreign  possessions  was  shamefully  dishonest  and 
incredibly  cruel  and  rapacious.  The  prosecution  of  Verres,  the 
proprietor  of  Sicily,  exposed  the  scandalous  rule  of  the  oligarchy, 
into  whose  hands  the  government  had  fallen.  For  three  years 
Verres  plundered  and  ravaged  that  island  with  impunity.  He  sold 
all  the  offices,  and  all  his  decisions  as  judge.  He  demanded  of 
the  farmers  the  greater  part  of  their  crops,  which  he  sold,  to  swell 
his  already  enormous  fortune.  Agriculture  was  thus  ruined,  and 
the  farms  were  abandoned.  Verres  had  a  taste  for  art,  and  when 
on  his  tours  through  the  island  confiscated  gems,  vases,  statues, 
paintings,  and  other  things  that  struck  his  fancy,  whether  in  tem- 
ples or  private  dwellings.  He  even  caused  a  Roman  trader,  for  a 
slight  offence,  to  be  crucified,  "  the  cross  being  set  on  the  beach 


THE  MEDITERRANEAN  PIRATES.  287 

within  sight  of  Italy,  that  he  might  address  to  his  native  shores  the 
ineffectual  cry  '  I  am  a  Roman  citizen.'  " 

Verres  could  not  be  called  to  account  while  in  office ;  and  it 
was  doubtful  whether,  after  the  end  of  his  term,  he  could  be  con- 
victed, so  corrupt  and  venal  had  become  the  members  of  the 
Senate,  before  whom  all  such  offenders  must  be  tried.  Indeed, 
Verres  himself  openly  boasted  that  he  intended  two  thirds  of  his 
gains  for  his  judges  and  lawyers,  while  the  remaining  one  third 
would  satisfy  himself. 

At  length,  after  Sicily  had  come  to  look  as  though  it  had  been 
ravaged  by  barbarian  conquerors,  the  infamous  robber  was  im- 
peached. The  prosecutor  was  Marcus  Tullius  Cicero,  the  brilliant 
orator,  who  was  at  this  time  just  rising  into  prominence  at  Rome. 
The  storm  of  indignation  raised  by  the  developments  of  the  trial 
caused  Verres  to  flee  into  exile  to  Massilia,  whither  he  took  with 
him  much  of  his  ill-gotten  wealth. 

War  with  the  Mediterranean  Pirates  (66  b.c).  —  The  Roman 
republic  was  now  threatened  by  a  new  danger  from  the  sea.  The 
Mediterranean  was  swarming  with  pirates.  Roman  conquests  in 
Africa,  Spain,  and  especially  in  Greece  and  Asia  Minor,  had  caused 
thousands  of  adventurous  spirits  from  those  maritime  countries  to 
flee  to  their  ships,  and  seek  a  livelihood  by  preying  upon  the 
commerce  of  the  seas.  The  cruelty  and  extortions  of  the  Roman 
governors  had  also  driven  large  numbers  to  the  same  course  of 
life.  These  corsairs  had  banded  themselves  into  a  sort  of  govern- 
ment, and  held  possession  of  numerous  strongholds  —  four  hun- 
dred, it  is  said  —  in  Cilicia,  Crete,  and  other  countries.  With  a 
full  thousand  swift  ships  they  scoured  the  waters  of  the  Mediterra- 
nean, so  that  no  merchantman  could  spread  her  sails  in  safety. 
They  formed  a  floating  empire,  which  Michelet  calls  "  a  wander- 
ing ( 'arthage,  which  no  one  knew  where  to  seize,  and  which  floated 
from  Spain  to  Asia." 

These  buccaneers,  the  Vikings  of  the  South,  made  descents 
upon  the  coast  everywhere,  plundered  villas  and  temples,  at- 
tacked and  captured  cities,  and  sold  the  inhabitants  as  slaves  in 


288         LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

the  various  slave- markets  of  the  Roman  world.  They  carried  off 
merchants  and  magistrates  from  the  Appian  Way  itself,  and  held 
them  for  ransom.  At  last  the  grain-ships  of  Sicily  and  Africa  were 
intercepted,  and  Rome  was  threatened  with  the  alternative  of  star- 
vation or  the  paying  of  an  enormous  ransom. 

The  Romans  now  bestirred  themselves.  Pompey  was  invested 
with  dictatorial  power  for  three  years  over  the  Mediterranean  and 
all  its  coasts  for  fifty  miles  inland.  An  armament  of  five  hundred 
ships  and  one  hundred  thousand  men  was  intrusted  to  his  com- 
mand. The  great  general  acted  with  his  characteristic  energy. 
Within  forty  days  he  had  swept  the  pirates  from  the  Western 
Mediterranean,  and  in  forty-nine  more  hunted  them  from  all  the 
waters  east  of  Italy,  captured  their  strongholds  in  Cilicia,  and 
settled  the  twenty  thousand  prisoners  that  fell  into  his  hands  in 
various  colonies  in  Asia  Minor  and  Greece.  Pompey's  vigorous 
and  successful  conduct  of  this  campaign  against  the  pirates  gained 
him  great  honor  and  reputation. 

Pompey  and  the  Mithridatic  War.  —  In  the  very  year  that 
Pompey  suppressed  the  pirates  (66  B.C.),  he  was  called  to  under- 
take a  more  difficult  task.  Mithridates  the  Great,  led  on  by  his 
ambition  and  encouraged  by  the  discontent  created  throughout  the 
Eastern  provinces  by  Roman  rapacity  and  misrule,  was  again  in 
arms  against  Rome.  He  had  stirred  almost  all  Asia  Minor  to 
revolt.  The  management  of  the  war  was  eventually  intrusted  to 
Pompey,  whose  success  in  the  war  of  the  pirates  had  aroused 
unbounded  enthusiasm  for  him. 

In  a  great  battle  in  Lesser  Armenia,  Pompey  almost  annihilated 
the  army  of  Mithridates.  The  king  fled  from  the  field,  and,  after 
seeking  in  vain  for  a  refuge  in  Asia  Minor,  sought  an  asylum  be- 
yond the  Caucasus  Mountains,  whose  bleak  barriers  interposed 
their  friendly  shield  between  him  and  his  pursuers.  Desisting  from 
the  pursuit,  Pompey  turned  south  and  conquered  Syria,  Phoe- 
nicia, and  Ccele-Syria,  which  countries  he  erected  into  a  Roman 
province.  Still  pushing  southward,  the  conqueror  entered  Pales- 
tine, and  after  a  short  siege  captured  Jerusalem  (63  B.C.). 


POMPEY' S   TRIUMPH.  289 

While  Pompey  was  thus  engaged,  Mithridates  was  straining 
every  energy  to  raise  an  army  among  the  Scythian  tribes  with 
which  to  carry  out  a  most  daring  project. 
He  proposed  to  cross  Europe  and  fall 
upon  Italy  from  the  north.  A  revolt  on 
the  part  of  his  son  Pharnaces  ruined  all 
his  plans  and  hopes  ;  and  the  disappointed 
monarch,  to  avoid  falling  into  the  hands  of 
the  Romans,  took  his  own  life  (63  B.C.). 
His  death  removed  one  of  the  most  for- 
midable enemies  that  Rome  had  ever 
encountered.      Hamilcar,   Hannibal,  and  mithridates  yj. 

'  '  (The  Great.) 

Mithridates  were  the  three  great   names 

that  the  Romans   always   pronounced  with  respect   and   dread. 

Pompey's  Triumph.  — After  regulating  the  affairs  of  the  different 
states  and  provinces  in  the  East,  Pompey  set  out  on  his  return  to 
Rome,  where  he  enjoyed  such  a  triumph  as  never  before  had  been 
seen  since  Rome  had  become  a  city.  The  spoils  of  all  the  East 
were  borne  in  the  procession;  322  princes  walked  as  captives 
before  the  triumphal  chariot  of  the  conqueror ;  legends  upon  the 
banners  proclaimed  that  he  had  conquered  21  kings,  captured 
1000  strongholds,  900  towns,  and  800  ships,  and  subjugated  more 
than  12,000,000  people;  and  that  he  had  put  in  the  treasury 
more  than  $25,000,000,  besides  doubling  the  regular  revenues  of 
the  state.  He  boasted  that  three  times  he  had  triumphed,  and 
each  time  for  the  conquest  of  a  continent  —  first  for  Africa,  then 
for  Europe,  and  now  for  Asia,  which  completed  the  conquest  of 
the  world. 

The  Conspiracy  of  Catiline. — While  the  legions  were  absent 
from  Italy  with  Pompey  in  the  East,  a  most  daring  conspiracy 
against  the  government  was  formed  at  Rome.  Catiline,  a  ruined 
spendthrift,  had  gathered  a  large  company  of  profligate  young 
nobles,  weighed  down  with  debt  and  desperate  like  himself,  and 
had  deliberately  planned  to  murder  the  consuls  and  the  chief  men 
of  the  state,  and  to  plunder  and  burn  the  capital.     The  offices  of 


290         LAST   CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

the  new  government  were  to  be  divided  among  the  conspirators. 
They  depended  upon  receiving  aid  from  Africa  and  Spain,  and 
proposed  to  invite  to  their  standard  the  gladiators  in  the  various 
schools  of  Italy,  as  well  as  slaves  and  criminals.  The  proscrip- 
tions of  Sulla  were  to  be  renewed,  and  all  debts  were  to  be 
cancelled. 

Fortunately,  all  the  plans  of  the  conspirators  were  revealed  to 
the  consul  Cicero,  the  great  orator.  The  Senate  immediately 
clothed  the  consuls  with  dictatorial  power  with  the  usual  formula, 
that  they  should  take  care  that  the  republic  received  no  harm. 
The  gladiators  were  secured  ;  the  city  walls  were  manned  ;  and  at 
every  point  the  capital  and  state  were  armed  against  the  "  invisible 
foe."  Then  in  the  Senate-chamber,  with  Catiline  himself  present, 
Cicero  exposed  the  whole  conspiracy  in  a  famous  philippic,  known 
as  "The  First  Oration  against  Catiline."  The  senators  shrank 
from  the  conspirator,  and  left  the  seats  about  him  empty.  After 
a  feeble  effort  to  reply  to  Cicero,  overwhelmed  by  a  sense  of  his 
guilt,  and  the  cries  of  "  traitor"  and  "  parricide  "  from  the  senators, 
Catiline  fled  from  the  chamber,  and  hurried  out  of  the  city  to  the 
camp  of  his  followers,  in  Etruria.  In  a  desperate  battle  fought 
near  Pistoria  (52  B.C.),  he  was  slain  with  many  of  his  followers. 
His  head  was  borne  as  a  trophy  to  Rome.  Cicero  was  hailed  as 
the  "  Saviour  of  his  Country." 

Caesar,  Crassus,  and  Pompey.  —  Although  the  conspiracy  of 
Catiline  had  failed,  it  was  very  easy  to  foresee  that  the  downfall 
of  the  Roman  republic  was  near  at  hand.  Indeed,  from  this  time 
on  only  the  name  remains.  The  basis  of  the  institutions  of  the 
republic  —  the  old  Roman  virtue,  integrity,  patriotism,  and  faith 
in  the  gods  —  was  gone,  having  been  swept  away  by  the  tide  of 
luxury,  selfishness,  and  immorality  produced  by  the  long  series 
of  foreign  conquests  and  robberies  in  which  the  Roman  people 
had  been  engaged.  The  days  of  liberty  at  Rome  were  over. 
From  this  time  forward  the  government  was  really  in  the  hands 
of  ambitious  and  popular  leaders,  or  of  corrupt  combinations  and 


THE  FIRST   TRIUMVIRATE.  291 

"  rings."  Events  gather  about  a  few  great  names,  and  the  annals 
of  the  republic  become  biographical  rather  than  historical. 

There  were  now  in  the  state  three  men  —  Caesar,  Crassus,  and 
Pompey  —  who  were  destined  to  shape  affairs.  Caius  Julius  Caesar 
was  born  in  the  year  ioo  B.C.  Although  descended  from  an  old 
patrician  family,  still  his  sympathies,  and  an  early  marriage  to  the 
daughter  of  Cinna,  one  of  the  adherents  of  Marius,  led  him  early 
to  identify  himself  with  the  Marian,  or  democratic  party.  In  every 
way  Caesar  courted  public  favor.  He  lavished  enormous  sums 
upon  public  games  and  tables.  His  debts  are  said  to  have 
amounted  to  25,000,000  sesterces  ($1,250,000).  His  popularity 
was  unbounded.  A  successful  campaign  in  Spain  had  already 
made  known  to  himself,  as  well  as  to  others,  his  genius  as  a 
commander. 

Crassus  belonged  to  the  senatorial,  or  aristocratic  party.  He 
owed  his  influence  to  his  enormous  wealth,  being  one  of  the  rich- 
est men  in  the  Roman  world.  His  property  was  estimated  at  7100 
talents  (about  $7,500,000). 

With  Pompey  and  his  achievements  we  are  already  familiar. 
His  influence  throughout  the  Roman  world  was  great ;  for,  in 
settling  and  reorganizing  the  many  countries  he  subdued,  he  had 
always  taken  care  to  reconstruct  them  in  his  own  interest,  as  well 
as  in  that  of  the  republic.  The  offices,  as  we  have  seen,  were 
filled  with  his  friends  and  adherents  (see  p.  285).  This  patronage 
had  secured  for  him  incalculable  authority  in  the  provinces.  His 
veteran  legionaries,  too,  were  naturally  devoted  to  the  general 
who  had  led  them  so  often  to  victory. 

The  First  Triumvirate.  —  What  is  known  as  the  First  Trium- 
virate rested  on  the  genius  of  Caesar,  the  wealth  of  Crassus,  and 
the  achievements  of  Pompey.  It  was  a  coalition  or  private  ar- 
rangement entered  into  by  these  three  men  for  the  purpose  of 
securing  to  themselves  the  control  of  public  affairs.  Bach  pledged 
himself  to  work  for  the  interests  of  the  others.  Caesar  was  the 
manager  of  the  "ring,"  and  through  the  aid  of  his  colleagues 
secured  the  consulship  (59  B.C.). 


292          LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE   ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

Caesar's  Conquests  in  Gaul  and  Britain.  —  At  the  end  of  his 

consulship,  the  administration  of  the  provinces  of  Cisalpine  and 
Transalpine  Gaul  was  assigned  to  Caesar.  Already  he  was  re- 
volving in  his  mind  plans  for  seizing  supreme  power.  Beyond 
the  Alps  the  Gallic  and  Germanic  tribes  were  in  restless  move- 
ment. He  saw  there  a  grand  field  for  military  exploits,  which 
should  gain  for  him  such  glory  and  prestige  as,  in  other  fields, 
had  been  won  and  were  now  enjoyed  by  Pompey.  With  this 
achieved,  and  with  a  veteran  army  devoted  to  his  interests,  he 
might  hope  easily  to  attain  that  position  at  the  head  of  affairs 
towards  which  his  ambition  was  urging  him. 

In  the  spring  of  58  b.c.  alarming  intelligence  from  beyond  the 
Alps  caused  Caesar  to  hasten  from  Rome  into  Transalpine  Gaul. 
Now  began  a  series  of  eight  brilliant  campaigns  directed  against 
the  various  tribes  of  Gaul,  Germany,  and  Britain.  In  his  Com- 
mentaries Caesar  himself  has  left  us  a  faithful  and  graphic  account 
of  all  the  memorable  marches,  battles,  and  sieges  that  filled  the 
years  between  58  and  50  b.c. 

The  year  55  b.c.  marked  two  great  achievements.  Early  in  the 
spring  of  this  year  Caesar  constructed  a  bridge  across  the  Rhine, 
and  led  his  legions  against  the  Germans  in  their  native  woods 
and  swamps.  In  the  autumn  of  the  same  year  he  crossed,  by 
means  of  hastily  constructed  ships,  the  channel  that  separates  the 
mainland  from  Britain,  and  after  maintaining  a  foothold  upon  that 
island  for  two  weeks  withdrew  his  legions  into  Gaul  for  the  winter. 
The  following  season  he  made  another  invasion  of  Britain ;  but, 
after  some  encounters  with  the  fierce  barbarians,  recrossed  to  the 
mainland  without  having  established  any  permanent  garrisons  in 
the  island.  Almost  one  hundred  years  passed  away  before  the 
natives  of  Britain  were  again  molested  by  the  Romans  (see 
p.  312). 

In  the  year  5  2  b.c,  while  Caesar  was  absent  in  Italy,  a  general 
revolt  occurred  among  the  Gallic  tribes.  It  was  a  last  desperate 
struggle  for  the  recovery  of  their  lost  independence.  Vercinget- 
orix,  chief  of  the  Arverni,  was  the  leader  of  the  insurrection.    For 


RESULTS   OF  THE   GALLIC    WARS.  293 

a  time  it  seemed  as  though  the  Romans  would  be  driven  from  the 
country.  But  Caesar's  despatch  and  military  genius  saved  the 
province  to  the  republic. 

In  his  campaigns  in  Gaul,  Caesar  had  subjugated  three  hundred 
tribes,  captured  eight  hundred  cities,  and  slain  a  million  of  bar- 
barians —  one  third  of  the  entire  population  of  the  country.  An- 
other third  he  had  taken  prisoners.  Great  enthusiasm  was  aroused 
at  Rome  by  these  victories.  "  Let  the  Alps  now  sink,"  exclaimed 
Cicero  :  "  the  gods  raised  them  to  shelter  Italy  from  the  barba- 
rians :  they  are  now  no  longer  needed." 

Results  of  the  Gallic  Wars.  —  The  most  important  result  of 
the  Gallic  wars  of  Caesar  was  the  Romanizing  of  Gaul.  The  coun- 
try was  opened  to  Roman  traders  and  settlers,  who  carried  with 
them  the  language,  customs,  and  arts  of  Italy. 

Another  result  of  the  conquest  was  the  checking  of  the  migratory 
movements  of  the  German  tribes,  which  gave  Graeco-Roman  civil- 
ization time  to  become  thoroughly  rooted,  not  only  in  Gaul,  but 
also  in  Spain  and  other  lands. 

Rivalry  between  Caesar  and  Pompey :  Caesar  crosses  the  Rubi- 
con.—  While  Caesar  was  in  the  midst  of  his  Transalpine  wars, 
Crassus  was  leading  an  army  against  the  Parthians,  hoping  to  rival 
there  the  brilliant  conquests  of  Caesar  in  Gaul.  But  his  army  was 
almost  annihilated  by  the  Parthian  cavalry,  and  he  himself  was 
slain  (54  B.C.).  His  captors,  so  it  is  said,  poured  molten  gold 
down  his  throat,  that  he  might  be  sated  with  the  metal  which  he 
had  so  coveted  during  life.  In  the  death  of  Crassus,  Caesar  lost  his 
stanchest  friend,  one  who  had  never  failed  him,  and  whose  wealth 
had  been  freely  used  for  his  advancement. 

The  world  now  belonged  to  Caesar  and  Pompey.  That  the  in- 
satiable ambition  of  these  two  rivals  should  sooner  or  later  bring 
them  into  collision  was  inevitable.  Their  alliance  in  the  trium- 
virate was  simply  one  of  selfish  convenience,  not  of  friendship. 
While  Caesar  was  carrying  on  his  campaigns  in  Gaul,  Pompey  was 
at  Rome  watching  jealously  the  growing  reputation  of  his  great 
rival.     He  strove,  by  a  princely  liberality,  to  win  the  affections  of 


294         LAST   CENTURY   OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

the  common  people.  On  the  Field  of  Mars  he  erected  an  immense 
theatre  with  seats  for  forty  thousand  spectators.  He  gave  magnifi- 
cent games,  and  set  public  tables ;  and  when  the  interest  of  the 
people  in  the  sports  of  the  Circus  flagged,  he  entertained  them 
with  gladiatorial  combats.  In  a  similar  manner  Caesar  strength- 
ened himself  with  the  people  for  the  struggle  which  he  plainly 
foresaw.  He  sought  in  every  way  to  ingratiate  himself  with  the 
Gauls  ;  increased  the  pay  of  his  soldiers  ;  conferred  the  privileges 
of  Roman  citizenship  upon  the  inhabitants  of  different  cities  in  his 
province  j  and  sent  to  Rome  enormous  sums  of  gold  to  be  ex- 
pended in  the  erection  of  temples,  theatres,  and  other  public 
structures,  and  in  the  celebration  of  games  and  shows  that  should 
rival  in  magnificence  those  given  by  Pompey. 

The  terrible  condition  of  affairs  at  the  capital  favored  the  ambi- 
tion of  Pompey.  So  selfish  and  corrupt  were  the  members  of  the 
Senate,  so  dead  to  all  virtue  and  to  every  sentiment  of  patriotism 
were  the  people,  that  even  such  patriots  as  Cato  and  Cicero  saw 
no  hope  for  the  maintenance  of  the  republic.  The  former  favored 
the  appointment  of  Pompey  as  sole  consul  for  one  year,  which 
was  about  the  same  thing  as  making  him  dictator.  "  It  is  better," 
said  Cato,  "  to  choose  a  master  than  to  wait  for  the  tyrant  whom 
anarchy  will  impose  upon  us."  The  "  tyrant "  in  his  and  every- 
body's mind  was  Caesar. 

Pompey  now  broke  with  Caesar,  and  attached  himself  again  to 
the  old  aristocratic  party,  which  he  had  deserted  for  the  alliance 
and  promises  of  the  triumvirate.  The  death  at  this  time  of  his 
wife  Julia,  the  daughter  of  Caesar,  severed  the  bonds  of  relation- 
ship at  the  same  moment  that  those  of  ostensible  friendship  were 
broken. 

The  Senate,  hostile  to  Caesar,  now  issued  a  decree  that  he  should 
resign  his  office,  and  disband  his  Gallic  legions  by  a  stated  day. 
The  crisis  had  now  come.  Caesar  ordered  his  legions  to  hasten 
from  Gaul  into  Italy.  Without  waiting  for  their  arrival,  at  the 
head  of  a  small  body  of  veterans  that  he  had  with  him  at  Ravenna, 
he  crossed  the  Rubicon,  a  little  stream  that  marked  the  boundary 


WAR   OF  CjESAR  AND  POMPEY.  295 

of  his  province.  This  was  a  declaration  of  war.  As  he  plunged 
into  the  river,  he  exclaimed,  "The  die  is  cast." 

The  Civil  War  of  Caesar  and  Pompey  (49-48  B.C.). — The 
bold  movement  of  Caesar  produced  great  consternation  at  Rome. 
Realizing  the  danger  of  delay,  Caesar,  without  waiting  for  the 
Gallic  legions  to  join  him,  marched  southward.  One  city  after 
another  threw  open  its  gates  to  him ;  legion  after  legion  went  over 
to  his  standard.  Pompey  and  the  Senate  hastened  from  Rome 
to  Brundisium,  and  thence,  with  about  twenty-five  thousand  men, 
fled  across  the  Adriatic  into  Greece.  Within  sixty  days  Caesar 
made  himself  undisputed  master  of  all  Italy. 

Pompey  and  Caesar  now  controlled  the  Roman  world.  It  was 
large,  but  not  large  enough  for  both  these  ambitious  men.  As  to 
which  was  likely  to  become  sole  master,  it  were  difficult  for  one 
watching  events  at  that  time  to  foresee.  Caesar  held  Italy,  Illyri- 
cum,  and  Gaul,  with  the  resources  of  his  own  genius  and  the  idol- 
atrous attachment  of  his  soldiers ;  Pompey  controlled  Spain,  Africa, 
Sicily,  Sardinia,  Greece,  and  the  provinces  of  Asia,  with  the  pres- 
tige of  his  great  name  and  the  indefinite  resources  of  the  East. 

Caesar's  first  care  was  to  pacify  Italy.  His  moderation  and  pru- 
dence won  all  classes  to  his  side.  Many  had  looked  to  see  the  ter- 
rible scenes  of  the  days  of  Marius  and  Sulla  re-enacted.  Caesar, 
however,  soon  gave  assurance  that  life  and  property  should  be  held 
sacred.  He  needed  money  \  but,  to  avoid  laying  a  tax  upon  the 
people,  he  asked  for  the  treasure  kept  beneath  the  Capitol.  Legend 
declared  that  this  gold  was  the  actual  ransom-money  which  Bren- 
nus  had  demanded  of  the  Romans,  and  which  Camillus  had  saved 
by  his  timely  appearance  (see  p.  241).  It  was  esteemed  sacred, 
and  was  never  to  be  used  save  in  case  of  another  Gallic  invasion. 
When  Caesar  attempted  to  get  possession  of  the  treasure,  the  trib- 
une Metellus  prevented  him  ;  but  Caesar  impatiently  brushed  him 
aside,  saying,  "  The  fear  of  a  Gallic  invasion  is  over  :  I  have  sub- 
dued the  Gauls." 

With  order  restored  in  Italy,  Caesar's  next  movement  was  to  gain 
control  of  the  wheat-fields  of  Sicily,  Sardinia,  and  Africa.    A  single 


296  LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

legion  brought  over  Sardinia  without  resistance  to  the  side  of 
Caesar.  Cato,  the  lieutenant  of  Pompey,  fled  from  before  Curio 
out  of  Sicily.  In  Africa,  however,  the  lieutenant  of  Caesar  sus- 
tained a  severe  defeat,  and  the  Pompeians  held  their  ground  there 
until  the  close  of  the  war.  Caesar,  meanwhile,  had  subjugated 
Spain.  In  forty  days  the  entire  peninsula  was  brought  under  his 
authority.  Massilia  had  ventured  to  close  her  gates  against  the 
conqueror ;  but  a  brief  siege  forced  the  city  to  capitulate.  Caesar 
was  now  free  to  turn  his  forces  against  Pompey  in  the  East. 

The  Battle  of  Pharsalus  (48  b.c).  —  From  Brundisium  Caesar 
embarked  his  legions  for  Epirus.  The  armies  of  the  rivals  met 
upon  the  plains  of  Pharsalia,  in  Thessaly.  The  adherents  of  Pom- 
pey were  so  confident  of  an  easy  victory  that  they  were  already 
disputing  about  the  offices  at  Rome,  and  were  renting  the  most 
eligible  houses  fronting  the  public  squares  of  the  capital.  The 
battle  was  at  length  joined.  It  proved  Pompey's  Waterloo.  His 
army  was  cut  to  pieces.  He  himself  fled  from  the  field,  and  es- 
caped to  Egypt.    Just  as  he  was  landing  there,  he  was  assassinated. 

The  head  of  the  great  general  was  severed  from  his  body  j  and 
when  Caesar,  who  was  pressing  after  Pompey  in  hot  pursuit,  landed 
in  Egypt,  the  bloody  trophy  was  brought  to  him.  He  turned  from 
the  sight  with  generous  tears.  It  was  no  longer  the  head  of  his 
rival,  but  of  his  old  associate  and  son-in-law.  He  ordered  the  as- 
sassins to  be  executed,  and  directed  that  fitting  obsequies  should 
be  performed  over  the  body. 

Close  of  the  Civil  War.  —  Caesar  was  detained  at  Alexandria  nine 
months  in  settling  a  dispute  respecting  the  throne  of  Egypt.  After 
a  severe  contest  he  overthrew  the  reigning  Ptolemy,  and  secured 
the  kingdom  to  the  celebrated  Cleopatra  and  a  younger  brother. 
Intelligence  was  now  brought  from  Asia  Minor  that  Pharnaces,  son 
of  Mithridates  the  Great,  was  inciting  a  revolt  among  the  peoples 
of  that  region.  Caesar  met  the  Pontic  king  at  Zela,  defeated  him, 
and  in  five  days  put  an  end  to  the  war.  His  laconic  message  to 
the  Senate,  announcing  his  victory,  is  famous.  It  ran  thus  :  Vent, 
vidi,  vici,  —  "I  came,  I  saw,  I  conquered." 


CjESARS    TRIUMPH.  297 

Caesar  now  hurried  back  to  Italy,  and  thence  proceeded  to 
Africa,  which  the  friends  of  the  old  republic  had  made  their  last 
chief  rallying-place.  At  the  great  battle  of  Thapsus  (46  B.C.)  they 
were  crushed.  Fifty  thousand  lay  dead  upon  the  field.  Cato, 
who  had  been  the  very  life  and  soul  of  the  army,  refusing  to  out- 
live the  republic,  took  his  own  life. 

Caesar's  Triumph.  —  Caesar  was  now  virtually  lord  of  the  Roman 
world.  Although  he  refrained  from  assuming  the  title  of  king,  no 
Eastern  monarch  was  ever  possessed  of  more  absolute  power,  or 
surrounded  by  more  abject  flatterers  and  sycophants.  He  was 
invested  with  all  the  offices  and  dignities  of  the  state.  The 
Senate  made  him  perpetual  dictator,  and  conferred  upon  him  the 
powers  of  censor,  consul,  and  tribune,  with  the  titles  of  Pontifex 
Maximus  and  Imperator  (whence  Emperor).  "He  was  to  sit  in 
a  golden  chair  in  the  Senate-house,  his  image  was  to  be  borne  in 
the  procession  of  the  gods,  and  the  seventh  month  of  the  year  was 
changed  in  his  honor  from  Quintilis  to  Julius"  [whence  our  July]. 

His  triumph  celebrating  his  many  victories  far  eclipsed  in  mag- 
nificence anything  that  Rome  had  before  witnessed.  In  the 
procession  were  led  captive  princes  from  all  parts  of  the  world. 
Beneath  his  standards  marched  soldiers  gathered  out  of  almost 
every  country  beneath  the  heavens.  Seventy-five  million  dollars 
of  treasure  were  displayed.  Splendid  games  and  tables  attested 
the  liberality  of  the  conqueror.  Sixty  thousand  couches  were  set 
for  the  multitudes.  The  shows  of  the  theatre  and  the  combats  of 
the  arena  followed  one  another  in  an  endless  round.  "  Above  the 
combats  of  the  amphitheatre  floated  for  the  first  time  the  awning 
of  silk,  the  immense  velarium  of  a  thousand  colors,  woven  from 
the  rarest  and  richest  products  of  the  East,  to  protect  the  people 
from  the  sun"  (Gibbon). 

Caesar  as  a  Statesman. — Caesar  was  great  as  a  general,  yet 
greater,  if  possible,  as  a  statesman.  The  measures  which  he  in- 
stituted evince  profound  political  sagacity  and  surprising  breadth 
of  view.  He  sought  to  reverse  the  jealous  and  narrow  policy  of 
Rome  in  the  past,  and  to  this  end  rebuilt  both  Carthage  and  Corinth, 


298  LAST   CENTURY   OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

and  founded  numerous  colonies  in  all  the  different  provinces,  in 
which  he  settled  about  one  hundred  thousand  of  the  poorer  citi- 
zens of  the  capital.  Upon  some  of  the  provincials  he  conferred  full 
Roman  citizenship,  and  upon  others  Latin  rights  (see  p.  246,  note), 
and  thus  strove  to  blend  the  varied  peoples  and  races  within  the 
boundaries  of  the  empire  in  a  real  nationality,  with  community  of 
interests  and  sympathies.  He  reformed  the  calendar  so  as  to 
bring  the  festivals  once  more  in  their  proper  seasons,  and  provided 
against  further  confusion  by  making  the  year  consist  of  365  days, 
with  an  added  day  for  every  fourth  or  leap  year. 

Besides  these  achievements,  Caesar  projected  many  vast  under- 
takings, which  the  abrupt  termination  of  his  life  prevented  his 
carrying  into  execution.  Among  these  was  his  projected  conquest 
of  the  Parthians  and  the  Germans.  He  proposed,  in  revenge  for 
the  defeat  and  death  of  his  friend  Crassus,  to  break  to  pieces  the 
Parthian  empire ;  then,  sweeping  with  an  army  around  above 
the  Euxine,  to  destroy  the  dreaded  hordes  of  Scythia ;  and  then, 
falling  upon  the  German  tribes  in  the  rear,  to  crush  their  power 
forever,  and  thus  relieve  the  Roman  empire  of  their  constant 
threat.  He  was  about  to  set  out  on  the  expedition  against  the 
Parthians,  when  he  was  struck  down  by  assassins. 

The  Death  of  Caesar.  —  Caesar  had  his  bitter  personal  enemies, 
who  never  ceased  to  plot  his  downfall.  There  were,  too,  sincere 
lovers  of  the  old  republic,  who  longed  to  see  restored  the  liberty 
which  the  conqueror  had  overthrown.  The  impression  began  to 
prevail  that  Caesar  was  aiming  to  make  himself  king.  A  crown  was 
several  times  offered  him  in  public  by  Mark  Antony  ;  but,  seeing  the 
manifest  displeasure  of  the  people,  he  each  time  pushed  it  aside. 
Yet  there  is  no  doubt  that  secretly  he  desired  it.  It  was  reported 
that  he  proposed  to  rebuild  the  walls  of  Troy,  whence  the  Roman 
race  had  sprung,  and  make  that  ancient  capital  the  seat  of  the 
new  Roman  empire.  Others  professed  to  believe  that  the  arts  and 
charms  of  the  Egyptian  Cleopatra,  who  had  borne  him  a  son  at 
Rome,  would  entice  him  to  make  Alexandria  the  centre  of  the 
proposed  kingdom.     So  many,  out  of  love  for  Rome  and  the  old 


THE  DEATH  OF   CALSAR.  299 

republic,  were  led  to  enter  into  a  conspiracy  against  the  life  of 
Caesar  with  those  who  sought  to  rid  themselves  of  the  dictator  for 
other  and  personal  reasons. 

The  Ides  (the  15th  day)  of  March,  44  B.C.,  upon  which  day 
the  Senate  convened,  witnessed  the  assassination.  Seventy  or 
eighty  conspirators,  headed  by  Cassius  and  Brutus,  both  of  whom 
had  received  special  favors  from  the  hands  of  Caesar,  were  con- 
cerned in  the  plot.  The  soothsayers  must  have  had  some  knowl- 
edge of  the  plans  of  the  conspirators,  for  they  had  warned  Caesar 
to  "  beware  of  the  Ides  of  March."  On  his  way  to  the  Senate- 
meeting  that  day,  a  paper  warning  him  of  his  danger  was  thrust  into 
his  hand ;  but,  not  suspecting  its  urgent  nature,  he  did  not  open 
it.  As  he  entered  the  assembly  chamber  he  observed  the  astrologer 
Spurinna,  and  remarked  carelessly  to  him,  referring  to  his  predic- 
tion, "  The  Ides  of  March  have  come."  "  Yes,"  replied  Spurinna, 
"  but  not  gone." 

No  sooner  had  Caesar  taken  his  seat  than  the  conspirators 
crowded  about  him  as  if  to  present  a  petition.  Upon"  a  signal 
from  one  of  their  number  their  daggers  were  drawn.  For  a  mo- 
ment Caesar  defended  himself ;  but  seeing  Brutus,  upon  whom  he 
had  lavished  gifts  and  favors,  among  the  conspirators,  he  exclaimed 
reproachfully,  Et  tu,  Brute!  —  "Thou,  too,  Brutus!"  drew  his 
mantle  over  his  face,  and  received  unresistingly  their  further 
thrusts.  Pierced  with  twenty-three  wounds,  he  sank  dead  at  the 
foot  of  Pompey's  statue. 

Funeral  Oration  by  Mark  Antony.  —  The  conspirators,  or 
u  liberators,"  as  they  called  themselves,  had  thought  that  the  Sen- 
ate would  confirm,  and  the  people  applaud,  their  act.  But  both 
people  and  senators,  struck  with  consternation,  were  silent.  Men's 
faces  grew  pale  as  they  recalled  the  proscriptions  of  Sulla,  and 
saw  in  the  assassination  of  Caesar  the  first  act  in  a  similar  reign 
of  terror.  As  the  conspirators  issued  from  the  assembly  hall,  and 
entered  the  Forum,  holding  aloft  their  bloody  daggers,  instead  of 
the  expected  acclamations  they  were  met  by  an  ominous  silence. 
The  liberators  hastened  for  safety  to  the  Temple  of  Jupiter  Capi- 


300 


LAST   CENTURY   OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 


tolinus,  going  thither  ostensibly  for  the  purpose  of  giving  thanks 
for  the  death  of  the  tyrant. 

Upon  the  day  set  for  the  funeral  ceremonies,  Mark  Antony,  the 
trusted  friend  and  secretary  of  Caesar,  mounted  the  rostrum  in 
the  Forum  to  deliver  the  usual  funeral  oration.  He  recounted  the 
great  deeds  of  Caesar,  the  glory  he  had  conferred  upon  the  Roman 
name,  dwelt  upon  his  liberality  and  his  munificent  bequests  to  the 
people  —  even  to  some  who  were  now  his  murderers  ;  and,  when 
he  had  wrought  the  feelings  of  the  multitude  to  the  highest  ten- 
sion, he  raised  the  robe  of  Caesar,  and 
showed  the  rents  made  by  the  daggers 
of  the  assassins.  Caesar  had  always 
been  beloved  by  the  people  and  idol- 
ized by  his  soldiers.  They  were  now 
driven  almost  to  frenzy  with  grief  and 
indignation.  Seizing  weapons  and 
torches,  they  rushed  through  the 
streets,  vowing  vengeance  upon  the 
conspirators.  The  liberators,  how- 
ever, escaped  from  the  fury  of  the 
mob,  and  fled  from  Rome,  Bru- 
tus and  Cassius  seeking  refuge  in 
Greece. 

The  Second  Triumvirate.  —  Antony  had  gained  possession  of 
the  will  and  papers  of  Caesar,  and  now,  under  color  of  carrying 
out  the  testament  of  the  dictator,  according  to  a  decree  of  the 
Senate,  entered  upon  a  course  of  high-handed  usurpation.  He 
was  aided  in  his  designs  by  Lepidus,  one  of  Caesar's  old  lieutenants. 
Very  soon  he  was  exercising  all  the  powers  of  a  real  dictator. 
"The  tyrant  is  dead,"  said  Cicero,  "but  the  tyranny  still  lives." 
This  was  a  bitter  commentary  upon  the  words  of  Brutus,  who,  as 
he  drew  his  dagger  from  the  body  of  Caesar,  turned  to  Cicero, 
and  exclaimed,  "  Rejoice,  O  Father  of  your  Country,  for  Rome  is 
free."  Rome  could  not  be  free,  the  republic  could  not  be  re- 
established because  the  old  love  for  virtue  and  liberty  had  died 


MARK    ANTONY. 


THE   SECOND    TRIUMVIRATE. 


301 


out  from  among  the  people  —  had  been  overwhelmed  by  the  rising 
tide  of  vice,  corruption,  sensuality,  and  irreligion  that  had  set  in 
upon  the  capital. 

To  what  length  Antony  would  have  gone  in  his  career  of  usurpa- 
tion it  is  difficult  to  say,  had  he  not  been  opposed  at  this  point  by 
Caius  Octavius, 
the  grand-neph- 
ew of  Julius 
Caesar,  and  the 
one  whom  he 
had  named  in 
his  will  as  his 
heir  and  suc- 
cessor. Upon 
the  Senate  de- 
claring in  favor 
of  Octavius, 
civil  war  imme- 
diately broke 
out  between 
him  and  Anto- 
ny and  Lepi- 
dus.  After 
several  indeci- 
sive battles  be- 
tween the  for- 
ces of  the  rival 
competitors, 

Octavius  proposed  to  Antony  and  Lepidus  a  reconciliation.  The 
three  met  on  a  small  island  in  the  Rhenus,  a  little  stream  in  North- 
ern Italy,  and  there  formed  a  league  known  as  the  Second  Trium- 
virate (43  B.C.). 

The  plans  of  the  triumvirs  were  infamous.  They  first  divided 
the  world  among  themselves :  Octavius  was  to  have  the  govern- 
ment of  the  West ;  Antony,  that  of  the  East ;  while  to  Lepidus 


JULIUS  C/ESAR.     (From  a  Bust  in  the  Museum  of  the  Louvre.) 


302         LAST   CENTURY  OF  THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

fell  the  control  of  Africa.  A  general  proscription,  such  as  had 
marked  the  coming  to  power  of  Sulla  (see  p.  283),  was  then  re- 
solved upon.  It  was  agreed  that  each  should  give  up  to  the 
assassin  such  friends  of  his  as  had  incurred  the  ill  will  of  either  of 
the  other  triumvirs.  Under  this  arrangement  Octavius  gave  up 
his  friend  Cicero,  —  who  had  incurred  the  hatred  of  Antony  by- 
opposing  his  schemes,  —  and  allowed  his  name  to  be  put  at  the 
head  of  the  list  of  the  proscribed. 

The  friends  of  the  orator  urged  him  to  flee  the  country.  "  Let 
me  die,"  said  he,  "in  my  fatherland,  which  I  have  so  often  saved  ! " 
His  attendants  were  hurrying  him,  half  unwilling,  towards  the 
coast,  when  his  pursuers  came  up  and  despatched  him  in  the  lit- 
ter in  which  he  was  being  carried.  His  head  was  taken  to  Rome, 
and  set  up  in  front  of  the  rostrum,  "  from  which  he  had  so  often 
addressed  the  people  with  his  eloquent  appeals  for  liberty."  It 
is  told  that  Fulvia,  the  wife  of  Antony,  ran  her  gold  bodkin  through 
the  tongue,  in  revenge  for  the  bitter  philippics  it  had  uttered 
against  her  husband.  The  right  hand  of  the  victim — the  hand 
that  had  penned  the  eloquent  orations  —  was  nailed  to  the  rostrum. 

Cicero  was  but  one  victim  among  many  hundreds.  All  the 
dreadful  scenes  of  the  days  of  Sulla  were  re-enacted.  Three 
hundred  senators  and  two  thousand  knights  were  murdered. 
The  estates  of  the  wealthy  were  confiscated,  and  conferred  by 
the  triumvirs  upon  their  friends  and  favorites. 

Last  Struggle  of  the  Republic  at  Philippi  (42  b.c).  —  The 
friends  of  the  old  republic,  and  the  enemies  of  the  triumvirs,  were 
meanwhile  rallying  in  the  East.  Brutus  and  Cassius  were  the  ani- 
mating spirits.  The  Asiatic  provinces  were  plundered  to  raise 
money  for  the  soldiers  of  the  liberators.  Octavius  and  Antony,  as 
soon  as  they  had  disposed  of  their  enemies  in  Italy,  crossed  the 
Adriatic  into  Greece,  to  disperse  the  forces  of  the  republicans 
there.  The  liberators,  advancing  to  meet  them,  passed  over 
the  Hellespont  into  Thrace. 

Tradition  tells  how  one  night  a  spectre  appeared  to  Brutus  and 
seemed  to  say,  "  I  am  thy  evil  genius ;  we  will  meet  again  at  Phil- 


ANTONY  AND   CLEOPATRA.  303 

ippi."  At  Philippi,  in  Thrace,  the  hostile  armies  met  (42  B.C.). 
In  two  successive  engagements  the  new  levies  of  the  liberators 
were  cut  to  pieces,  and  both  Brutus  and  Cassius,  believing  the 
cause  of  the  republic  forever  lost,  committed  suicide.  It  was, 
indeed,  the  last  effort  of  the  republic.  The  history  of  the  events 
that  lie  between  the  action  at  Philippi  and  the  establishment  of 
the  empire  is  simply  a  record  of  the  struggles  among  the  triumvirs 
for  the  possession  of  the  prize  of  supreme  power.  After  various 
redistributions  of  provinces,  Lepidus  was  at  length  expelled  from 
the  triumvirate,  and  then  again  the  Roman  world,  as  in  the  times 
of  Caesar  and  Pompey,  was  in  the  hands  of  two  masters  —  Antony 
in  the  East,  and  Octavius  in  the  West. 

Antony  and  Cleopatra. — After  the  battle  of  Philippi,  Antony 
went  into  Asia  for  the  purpose  of  settling  the  affairs  of  the  prov- 
inces and  vassal  states  there.  He  summoned  Cleopatra,  the  fair 
queen  of  Egypt,  to  meet  him  at  Tarsus,  in  Cilicia,  there  to  give 
account  to  him  for  the  aid  she  had  rendered  the  liberators.  She 
obeyed  the  summons,  relying  upon  the  power  of  her  charms  to 
appease  the  anger  of  the  triumvir.  She  ascended  the  Cydnus 
in  a  gilded  barge,  with  oars  of  silver,  and  sails  of  purple  silk.  Be- 
neath awnings  wrought  of  the  richest  manufactures  of  the  East, 
the  beautiful  queen,  attired  to  personate  Venus,  reclined  amidst 
lovely  attendants  dressed  to  represent  cupids  and  nereids.  An- 
tony was  completely  fascinated,  as  had  been  the  great  Caesar 
before  him,  by  the  dazzling  beauty  of  the  "  Serpent  of  the  Nile." 
Enslaved  by  her  enchantments,  and  charmed  by  her  brilliant  wit, 
in  the  pleasure  of  her  company  he  forgot  all  else  —  ambition  and 
honor  and  country. 

Once,  indeed,  Antony  did  rouse  himself  and  break  away  from 
his  enslavement  to  lead  the  Roman  legions  across  the  Euphrates 
against  the  Parthians.  But  the  storms  of  approaching  winter,  and 
the  incessant  attacks  of  the  Parthian  cavalry,  at  length  forced  him 
to  make  a  hurried  and  disastrous  retreat.  He  hastened  back 
to  Egypt,  and  sought  to  forget  his  shame  and  disappointment 
amidst  the  revels  of  the  Egyptian  court. 


304  LAST   CENTURY  OF   THE  ROMAN  REPUBLIC. 

The  Battle  of  Actium  (31  b.c).  —  Affairs  could  not  long  con- 
tinue in  their  present  course.  Antony  had  put  away  his  faithful 
wife  Octavia  for  the  beautiful  Cleopatra.  It  was  whispered  at 
Rome,  and  not  without  truth,  that  he  proposed  to  make  Alexan- 
dria the  capital  of  the  Roman  world,  and  announce  Caesarion,  son 
of  Julius  Caesar  and  Cleopatra,  as  heir  of  the  empire.  All  Rome 
was  stirred.  It  was  evident  that  a  conflict  was  at  hand  in  which 
the  question  for  decision  would  be  whether  the  West  should  rule 
the  East,  or  the  East  rule  the  West.  All  eyes  were  instinctively 
turned  to  Octavius  as  the  defender  of  Italy,  and  the  supporter  of 
the  sovereignty  of  the  Eternal  City.  Both  parties  made  the  most 
gigantic  preparations.  Octavius  met  the  combined  fleets  of  Antony 
and  Cleopatra  just  off  the  promontory  of  Actium,  on  the  Grecian 
coast.  While  the  issue  of  the  battle  that  there  took  place  was  yet 
undecided,  Cleopatra  turned  her  galley  in  flight.  The  Egyptian 
ships,  to  the  number  of  fifty,  followed  her  example.  Antony,  as 
soon  as  he  perceived  the  withdrawal  of  Cleopatra,  forgot  all  else, 
and  followed  in  her  track  with  a  swift  galley.  Overtaking  the 
fleeing  queen,  the  infatuated  man  was  received  aboard  her  vessel, 
and  became  her  partner  in  the  disgraceful  flight. 

The  abandoned  fleet  and  army  surrendered  to  Octavius.  The 
conqueror  was  now  sole  master  of  the  civilized  world.  From  this 
decisive  battle  (31  B.C.)  are  usually  dated  the  end  of  the  republic 
and  the  beginning  of  the  empire.  Some,  however,  make  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  empire  date  from  the  year  27  B.C.,  as  it  was  not 
until  then  that  Octavius  was  formally  invested  with  imperial  powers. 

Deaths  of  Antony  and  Cleopatra.  —  Octavius  pursued  Antony 
to  Egypt,  where  the  latter,  deserted  by  his  army,  and  informed  by 
a  messenger  from  the  false  queen  that  she  was  dead,  committed 
suicide.  Cleopatra  then  sought  to  enslave  Octavius  with  her 
charms ;  but,  failing  in  this,  and  becoming  convinced  that  he  pro- 
posed to  take  her  to  Rome  that  she  might  there  grace  his  triumph, 
she  took  her  own  life,  being  in  the  thirty-eighth  year  of  her  age. 
Tradition  says  that  she  effected  her  purpose  by  applying  an  asp  to 
her  arm.     But  it  is  really  unknown  in  what  way  she  killed  herself. 


W 


REIGN  OF  AUGUSTUS   CAESAR.  305 


CHAPTER    XXIX. 

THE  ROMAN   EMPIRE. 

(From  31  B.C.  to  a.d.  180.) 

Reign  of  Augustus  Caesar  (31  b.c.  to  a.d.  14).  —  The  hun- 
dred years  of  strife  which  ended  with  the  battle  of  Actium  left 
the  Roman  republic,  exhausted  and  helpless,  in  the  hands  of  one 
wise  enough  and  strong  enough  to  remould  its  crumbling  frag- 
ments in  such  a  manner  that  the  state,  which  seemed  ready  to 
fall  to  pieces,  might  prolong  its  existence  for  another  five  hundred 
years.  It  was  a  great  work  thus  to  create  anew,  as  it  were,  out  of 
anarchy  and  chaos,  a  political  fabric  that  should  exhibit  such 
elements  of  perpetuity  and  strength.  "  The  establishment  of  the 
Roman  empire,"  says  Merivale,  "was,  after  all,  the  greatest  politi- 
cal work  that  any  human  being  ever  wrought.  The  achievements 
of  Alexander,  of  Caesar,  of  Charlemagne,  of  Napoleon,  are  not  to 
be  compared  with  it  for  a  moment." 

The  government  which  Octavius  established  was  a  monarchy  in 
fact,  but  a  republic  in  form.  Mindful  of  the  fate  of  Julius  Caesar, 
who  fell  because  he  gave  the  lovers  of  the  republic  reason  to 
think  that  he  coveted  the  title  of  king,  Octavius  carefully  veiled 
his  really  absolute  sovereignty  under  the  forms  of  the  old  repub- 
lican state.  The  Senate  still  existed ;  but  so  completely  subjected 
were  its  members  to  the  influence  of  the  conqueror  that  the  only 
function  it  really  exercised  was  the  conferring  of  honors  and  titles 
and  abject  flatteries  upon  its  master.  All  the  republican  officials 
remained  ;  but  Octavius  absorbed  and  exercised  their  chief  powers 
and  functions.  He  had  the  powers  of  consul,  tribune,  censor,  and 
Pontifex  Maximus.  All  the  republican  magistrates  —  the  consuls, 
the  tribunes,  the  praetors  —  were  elected  as  usual ;  but  they  were 
simply  the  nominees  and  creatures  of  the  emperor.     They  w^. 


306 


THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 


the  effigies  and  figure-heads  to  delude  the  people  into  believing 
that  the  republic  still  existed.  Never  did  a  people  seem  more 
content  with  the  shadow  after  the  loss  of  the  substance. 

The  Sen- 
ate, acting 
under  the 
inspiration 
of  Octavius, 
withheld 
from  him 
the    title   of 

king,  which  ever  since  the  ex- 
pulsion of  the  Tarquins,  five 
centuries  before  this  time,  had 
been  intolerable  to  the  peo- 
ple ;  but  they  conferred  upon 
him  the  titles  of  Imperator 
and  Augustus,  the  latter  hav- 
ing been  hitherto  sacred  to  the 
gods.  The  sixth  month  of  the 
Roman  year  was  called  Au- 
gustus (whence  our  August) 
in  his  honor,  an  act  in  imi- 
tation of  that  by  which  the 
preceding  month  had  been 
given  the  name  of  Julius  in 
honor  of  Julius  Caesar. 

The  domains  over  which 
Augustus  held  sway  were  im- 
perial in  magnitude.  They 
stretched  from  the  Atlantic 
to  the  Euphrates,  and  upon 
the  north  were  hemmed  by 
he  forests  of  Germany  and 

h,bleak  steppes  of  Scythia,  and  were  bordered  on  the  south  by 


REIGN  OF  AUGUSTUS   CsESAR.  307 

the  sands  of  the  African  desert  and  the  dreary  wastes  of  Arabia, 
which  seemed  the  boundaries  set  by  nature  to  dominion  in  those 
directions.  Within  these  limits  were  crowded  more  than  100,000,- 
000  people,  embracing  every  conceivable  condition  and  variety  in 
race  and  culture,  from  the  rough  barbarians  of  Gaul  to  the  refined 
voluptuary  of  the  East. 

Octavius  was  the  first  to  moderate  the  ambition  of  the  Romans, 
and  to  council  them  not  to  attempt  to  conquer  any  more  of  the 
world,  but  rather  to  devote  their  energies  to  the  work  of  consoli- 
dating the  domains  already  acquired.  He  saw  the  dangers  that 
would  attend  any  further  extension  of  the  boundaries  of  the  state. 

The  reign  of  Augustus  lasted  forty- four  years,  from  31  B.C.  to  a.d. 
14.  It  embraced  the  most  splendid  period  of  the  annals  of  Rome. 
Under  the  patronage  of  the  emperor,  and  that  of  his  favorite 
minister  Maecenas,  poets  and  writers  flourished  and  made  this  the 
"golden  age  "  of  Latin  literature.  During  this  reign  Virgil  com- 
posed his  immortal  epic  of  the  ALneid,  and  Horace  his  famous 
odes ;  while  Livy  wrote  his  inimitable  history,  and  Ovid  his  Meta- 
morphoses. Many  who  lamented  the  fall  of  the  republic  sought 
solace  in  the  pursuit  of  letters ;  and  in  this  they  were  encouraged 
by  Augustus,  as  it  gave  occupation  to  many  restless  spirits  that 
would  otherwise  have  been  engaged  in  political  intrigues  against 
his  government. 

Augustus  was  also  a  munificent  patron  of  architecture  and  art. 
He  adorned  the  capital  with  many  splendid  structures.  Said  he 
proudly,  "  I  found  Rome  a  city  of  brick ;  I  left  it  a  city  of  mar- 
ble." The  population  of  the  city  at  this  time  was  probably  about 
one  million. 

Although  the  government  of  Augustus  was  disturbed  by  some 
troubles  upon  the  frontiers,  still  never  before,  perhaps,  did  the 
world  enjoy  so  long  a  period  of  general  rest  from  the  preparation 
and  turmoil  of  war.  Three  times  during  this  auspicious  reign  the 
gates  of  the  Temple  of  Janus  at  Kome,  which  were  open  in  time 
of  war  and  closed  in  time  of  peace,  were  shut.  Only  twice  before 
during  the  entire  history  of  the  city  had  they  been  closed,  so  con- 


308  THE   ROMAN  EMPIRE. 

stantly  had  the  Roman  people  been  engaged  in  war.  It  was  in 
the  midst  of  this  happy  reign,  when  profound  peace  prevailed 
throughout  the  civilized  world,  that  Christ  was  born  in  Bethlehem 
of  Judea.  The  event  was  unheralded  at  Rome  \  yet  it  was  filled 
with  profound  significance,  not  only  for  the  Roman  empire,  but 
for  the  world. 

The  latter  years  of  the  life  of  Augustus  were  clouded  both  by 
domestic  bereavement  and  national  disaster.  His  beloved  nephew 
Marcellus,  and  his  two  grandsons  Caius  and  Lucius,  whom  he 
purposed  making  his  heirs,  were  all  removed  by  death ;  and  then, 
far  away  in  the  German  forest,  his  general  Varus,  who  had  at- 
tempted to  rule  the  freedom-loving  Teutons  as  he  had  governed 
the  abject  Asiatics  of  the  Eastern  provinces,  was  surprised  by  the 
barbarians,  led  by  their  brave  chief  Hermann,  —  Arminius,  as  called 
by  the  Romans,  — and  his  army  destroyed  almost  to  a  man  (a.d.  9) . 
Twenty  thousand  of  the  legionaries  lay  dead  and  unburied  in  the 
tangled  woods  and  morasses  of  Germany. 

The  victory  of  Arminius  over  the  Roman  legions  was  an  event 
of  the  greatest  significance  in  the  history  of  European  civilization. 
Germany  was  almost  overrun  by  the  Roman  army.  The  Teutonic 
tribes  were  on  the  point  of  being  completely  subjugated  and 
Romanized,  as  had  been  the  Celts  of  Gaul  before  them.  Had 
this  occurred,  the  entire  history  of  Europe  would  have  been 
changed ;  for  the  Germanic  element  is  the  one  that  has  given 
shape  and  color  to  the  important  events  of  the  last  fifteen  hundred 
years.  Those  barbarians,  too,  were  our  ancestors.  Had  Rome 
succeeded  in  exterminating  or  enslaving  them,  Britain,  as  Creasy 
says,  would  never  have  received  the  name  of  England,  and  the 
great  English  nation  would  never  have  had  an  existence. 

In  the  year  a.d.  14,  Augustus  died,  having  reached  the  seventy- 
sixth  year  of  his  age.  It  was  believed  that  his  soul  ascended 
visibly  amidst  the  flames  of  the  funeral  pyre.  By  decree  of  the 
Senate  divine  worship  was  accorded  to  him,  and  temples  were 
erected  in  his  honor. 

One  of  the  most  important  of  the  acts  of  Augustus,  in  its  influ- 


REIGN  OF   TIBERIUS.  309 

ence  upon  following  events,  was  the  formation  of  the  Praetorian 
Guard,  which  was  designed  for  a  sort  of  body-guard  to  the  em- 
peror. In  the  succeeding  reign  this  body  of  soldiers,  about  ten 
thousand  in  number,  was  given  a  permanent  camp  alongside  the 
city  walls.  It  soon  became  a  formidable  power  in  the  state,  and 
made  and  unmade  emperors  at  will. 

Eeign  of  Tiberius  (a.d.  14-37).  —  Tiberius  succeeded  to  an 
unlimited  sovereignty.  The  Senate  conferred  upon  him  all  the 
titles  that  had  been  worn  by  Augustus.  One  of  the  first  acts  of 
Tiberius  gave  the  last  blow  to  the  ancient  republican  institutions. 
He  took  away  from  the  popular  assembly  the  privilege  of  electing 
the  consuls  and  praetors,  and  bestowed  the  same  upon  the  Senate, 
which,  however,  must  elect  from  candidates  presented  by  the 
emperor.  As  the  Senate  was  the  creation  of  the  emperor,  who  as 
censor  made  up  the  list  of  its  members,  he  was  now  of  course  the 
source  and  fountain  of  all  patronage.'  During  the  first  years  of 
his  reign,  Tiberius  used  his  practically  unrestrained  authority  with 
moderation  and  justice,  but  soon  yielding  to  the  promptings  of  a 
naturally  cruel,  suspicious,  and  jealous  nature,  he  entered  upon  a 
course  of  the  most  high-handed  tyranny.  He  enforced  oppressively 
an  old  law,  known  as  the  law  of  majestas,  which  made  it  a  capital 
offence  for  any  one  to  speak  a  careless  word,  or  even  to  entertain 
an  unfriendly  thought,  respecting  the  emperor.  "  It  was  dangerous 
to  speak,  and  equally  dangerous  to  keep  silent,"  says  Leighton, 
"  for  silence  even  might  be  construed  into  discontent."  Rewards 
were  offered  to  informers,  and  hence  sprang  up  a  class  of  persons 
called  "  delators,"  who  acted  as  spies  upon  society.  Often  false 
charges  were  made,  to  gratify  personal  enmity ;  and  many,  espe- 
cially of  the  wealthy  class,  were  accused  and  put  to  death  that 
their  property  might  be  confiscated. 

Tiberius  appointed,  as  his  chief  minister  and  as  commander  of 
the  praetorians,  one  Sejanus,  a  man  of  the  lowest  and  most  corrupt 
life.  This  officer  actually  persuaded  Tiberius  to  retire  to  the 
little  island  of  Capreae,  in  the  Bay  of  Naples,  and  leave  to  him 
the  management  of  affairs  at  Rome.    The  emperor  built  several 


310  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 

villas  in  different  parts  of  the  beautiful  islet,  and,  having  gathered 
a  band  of  congenial  companions,  passed  in  this  pleasant  retreat 
the  later  years  of  his  reign.  Both  Tacitus  the  historian  and 
Suetonius  the  biographer  tell  many  stories  of  the  scandalous 
profligacy  of  the  emperor's  life  on  the  island;  but  these  tales, 
it  should  be  added,  are  discredited  by  some. 

Meanwhile,  Sejanus  was  ruling  at  Rome  very  much  according 
to  his  own  will.  No  man's  life  was  safe.  He  even  grew  so  bold 
as  to  plan  the  assassination  of  the  emperor  himself.  His  designs, 
however,  became  known  to  Tiberius ;  and  the  infamous  and  dis- 
loyal minister  was  arrested  and  put  to  death. 

After  the  execution  of  his  minister,  Tiberius  ruled  more  des- 
potically than  ever  before.  Multitudes  sought  refuge  from  his 
tyranny  in  suicide.  Death  at  last  relieved  the  world  of  the  mon- 
ster. His  end  was  probably  hastened  by  his  attendants,  who  are 
believed  to  have  smothered  him  in  his  bed,  as  he  lay  dying. 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  the  reign  of  Tiberius  that,  in  a  remote 
province  of  the  Roman  empire,  the  Saviour  was  crucified.  Ani- 
mated by  an  unparalleled  missionary  spirit,  His  followers  traversed 
the  length  and  breadth  of  the  empire,  preaching  everywhere  the 
"  glad  tidings."  Men's  loss  of  faith  in  the  gods  of  the  old  mytholo- 
gies, the  softening  and  liberalizing  influence  of  Greek  culture,  the 
unification  of  the  whole  civilized  world  under  a  single  govern- 
ment, the  widespread  suffering  and  the  inexpressible  weariness  of 
the  oppressed  and  servile  classes,  —  all  these  things  had  prepared 
the  soil  for  the  seed  of  the  new  doctrines.  In  less  than  three 
centuries  the  Pagan  empire  had  become  Christian  not  only  in 
name,  but  also  very  largely  in  fact.  This  conversion  of  Rome  is 
one  of  the  most  important  events  in  all  history.  A  new  element 
is  here  introduced  into  civilization,  an  element  which  we  shall  find 
giving  color  and  character  to  very  much  of  the  story  of  the  eighteen 
centuries  that  we  have  yet  to  study. 

Reign  of  Caligula  (a.d.  37-41).  —  Caius  Caesar,  better  known 
as  Caligula,  was  only  twenty-five  years  of  age  when  the  death  of 
Tiberius  called  him  to  the  throne.     His  career  was  very  similar  to 


REIGN  OF  CLAUDIUS.  311 

that  of  Tiberius.  After  a  few  months  spent  in  arduous  applica- 
tion to  the  affairs  of  the  empire,  during  which  time  his  many  acts 
of  kindness  and  piety  won  for  him  the  affections  of  all  classes,  the 
mind  of  the  young  emperor  became  unsettled,  and  he  began  to 
indulge  in  all  sorts  of  insanities.  The  cruel  sports  of  the  amphi- 
theatre possessed  for  him  a  strange  fascination.  When  animals 
failed,  he  ordered  spectators  to  be  seized  indiscriminately,  and 
thrown  to  the  beasts.  He  entered  the  lists  himself,  and  fought 
as  a  gladiator  upon  the  arena.  In  a  sanguinary  mood,  he  wished 
that  "  the  people  of  Rome  had  but  one  neck."  As  an  insult  to  his 
nobles,  he  gave  out  that  he  proposed  to  make  his  favorite  horse, 
Incitatus,  consul.  He  declared  himself  divine,  and  removing  the 
heads  of  Jupiter's  statues,  put  on  his  own. 

After  four  years  the  insane  career  of  Caligula  was  brought  to  a 
close  by  some  of  the  officers  of  the  praetorian  guard,  whom  he 
had  wantonly  insulted. 

Reign  of  Claudius  (a.d.  41-54). — The  reign  of  Claudius, 
Caligula's  successor,  was  signalized  by  the  conquest  of  Britain. 
Nearly  a  century  had  now  passed  since  the  invasion  of  the  island 
by  Julius  Caesar,  who,  as  has  been  seen  (see  p.  292),  simply  made 
a  reconnoissance  of  the  island  and  then  withdrew.  Claudius 
conquered  all  the  southern  portion  of  the  island,  and  founded 
many  colonies,  which  in  time  became  important  centres  of  Roman 
trade  and  culture.  The  leader  of  the  Britons  was  Caractacus. 
He  was  taken  captive  and  carried  to  Rome.  Gazing  in  astonish- 
ment upon  the  magnificence  of  the  imperial  city,  he  exclaimed, 
"  How  can  a  people  possessed  of  such  splendor  at  home  envy 
Caractacus  his  humble  cottage  in  Britain? " 

Claudius  distinguished  his  reign  by  the  execution  of  many  im- 
portant works.  At  the  mouth  of  the  Tiber  he  constructed  a 
magnificent  harbor,  called  the  Portus  Romanus.  The  Claudian 
Aqueduct,  which  he  completed,  was  a  stupendous  work,  bringing 
water  to  the  city  from  a  distance  of  forty-five  miles. 

The  delight  of  the  people  in  gladiatorial  shows  had  at  this  time 
become  almost  an  insane  frenzy.     Claudius  determined  to  give  an 


312  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 

entertainment  that  should  render  insignificant  all  similar  efforts. 
Upon  a  large  lake,  whose  sloping  bank  afforded  seats  for  the  vast 
multitudes  of  spectators,  he  exhibited  a  naval  battle,  in  which  two 
opposing  fleets,  bearing  nineteen  thousand  gladiators,  fought  as 
though  in  real  battle,  till  the  water  was  filled  with  thousands  of 
bodies,  and  covered  with  the  fragments  of  the  broken  ships. 

Throughout  his  life  Claudius  was  ruled  by  intriguing  favorites 
and  unworthy  wives.  For  his  fourth  wife  Claudius  married  the 
"wicked  Agrippina,"  who  secured  his  death  by  means  of  a  dish 
of  poisoned  mushrooms,  in  order  to  make  place  for  the  succes- 
sion of  her  son  Nero. 

Eeign  of  Nero  (a.d.  54-68). —  Nero  was  fortunate  in  having 
for  his  preceptor  the  great  philosopher  and  moralist  Seneca  ;  but 
never  was  teacher  more  unfortunate  in  his  pupil.  For  five  years 
Nero  ruled  with  moderation  and  equity.  He  then  broke  away 
from  the  guidance  of  his  tutor  Seneca,  and  entered  upon  a  career 
filled  with  crimes  of  almost  incredible  enormity.  The  dagger 
and  poison  —  the  latter  a  means  of  murder  the  use  of  which  at 
Rome  had  become  a  "  fine  art,"  and  was  in  the  hands  of  those 
who  made  it  a  regular  profession  —  were  employed  almost  un- 
ceasingly, to  remove  persons  that  had  incurred  his  hatred,  or  who 
possessed  wealth  that  he  coveted. 

It  was  in  the  tenth  year  of  his  reign  that  the  so-called  Great 
Fire  laid  more  than  half  of  Rome  in  ashes.  It  was  rumored  that 
Nero  had  ordered  the  conflagration  to  be  lighted,  and  that  from 
the  roof  of  his  palace  he  had  enjoyed  the  spectacle,  and  amused 
himself  by  singing  a  poem  which  he  had  written,  entitled  the 
"  Sack  of  Troy." 

Nero  did  everything  in  his  power  to  discredit  the  rumor.  To 
turn  attention  from  himself,  he  accused  the  Christians  of  having 
conspired  to  destroy  the  city,  in  order  to  help  out  their  prophecies. 
The  doctrine  which  was  taught  by  some  of  the  new  sect  respect- 
ing the  second  coming  of  Christ,  and  the  destruction  of  the  world 
by  fire,  lent  color  to  the  charge.  The  persecution  that  followed 
was  one  of  the  most  cruel  recorded  in  the  history  of  the  Church. 


REIGN  OF  NERO.  313 

Many  victims  were  covered  with  pitch  and  burned  at  night,  to 
serve  as  torches  in  the  imperial  gardens.  Tradition  preserves  the 
names  of  the  Apostles  Peter  and  Paul  as  victims  of  this  Neronian 
persecution. 

As  to  Rome,  the  conflagration  was  a  blessing  in  disguise.  The 
city  rose  from  its  ashes  as  quickly  as  Athens  from  her  ruins  at 
the  close  of  the  Persian  wars.  The  new  buildings  were  made  fire- 
proof;  and  the  narrow,  crooked  streets  reappeared  as  broad  and 
beautiful  avenues.  A  considerable  portion  of  the  burnt  region 
was  appropriated  by  Nero  for  the  buildings  and  grounds  of  an 
immense  palace,  called  the  "Golden  House."  It  covered  so 
much  space  that  the  people  "  maliciously  hinted  "  that  Nero  had 
fired  the  old  city,  in  order  to  make  room  for  it. 

The  emperor  secured  money  for  his  enormous  expenditures  by 
new  extortions,  murders,  and  confiscations.  No  one  of  wealth 
knew  but  that  his  turn  might  come  next.  A  conspiracy  was 
formed  among  the  nobles  to  relieve  the  state  of  the  monster.  The 
plot  was  discovered,  and  again  "  the  city  was  filled  with  funerals." 
Lucan  the  poet,  and  Seneca,  the  old  preceptor  of  Nero,  both  fell 
victims  to  the  tyrant's  rage. 

Nero  now  made  a  tour  through  the  East,  and  there  plunged 
deeper  and  deeper  into  every  shame,  sensuality,  and  crime.  The 
tyranny  and  the  disgrace  were  no  longer  endurable.  Almost  at 
the  same  moment  the  legions  in  several  of  the  provinces  revolted. 
The  Senate  decreed  that  Nero  was  a  public  enemy,  and  condemned 
him  to  a  disgraceful  death  by  scourging,  to  avoid  which  he  in- 
structed a  slave  how  to  give  him  a  fatal  thrust.  His  last  words 
were,  "  What  a  loss  my  death  will  be  to  art ! " 

Nero  was  the  sixth  and  last  of  the  Julian  line.  The  family  of 
the  Great  Caesar  was  now  extinct ;  but  the  name  remained,  and 
was  adopted  by  all  the  succeeding  emperors. 

Galba,  Otho,  and  Vitellius  (a.d.  68-69). —  These  tnree  names 
are  usually  grouped  together,  as  their  reigns  were  all  short  and 
uneventful.  The  succession,  upon  the  death  of  Nero  and  the 
extinction  in  him  of  the  Julian  line,  was  in  dispute,  and  the  legions 


i 


314 


THE   ROMAN  EMPIRE. 


in  different  quarters  supported  the  claims  of  their  favorite  leaders. 
One  after  another  the  three  aspirants  named  were  killed  in  bloody 
struggles  for  the  imperial  purple.  The  last,  Vitellius,  was  hurled 
from  the  throne  by  the  soldiers  of  Flavius  Vespasian,  the  old  and 
beloved  commander  of  the  legions  in  Palestine,  which  were  at  this 
time  engaged  in  a  war  with  the  Jews. 

Reign  of  Vespasian  (a.d.  69-79).  —  The  accession  of  Flavius 
Vespasian  marks  the  beginning  of  a  period,  embracing  three  reigns, 
known  as  the  Flavian  Age  (a.d.  69-96).  Vespasian's  reign  was 
signalized  both  by  important  military  achievements  abroad  and  by 
stupendous  public  works  undertaken  at  Rome. 

After  one  of  the  most  harassing  sieges  recorded  in  history, 
Jerusalem  was  taken  by  Titus,  son  of  Vespasian.     The  Temple 

was  destroyed, 
and  more  than 
a  million  of 
Jews  that  were 
crowded  in  the 
city  are  believed 
to  have  perished. 
Great  multitudes 
suffered  death  by 
crucifixion.  The 
miserable  remnants  of  the  nation  were  scattered  everywhere  over 
the  world.  Josephus,  the  great  historian,  accompanied  the  con- 
queror to  Rome.  In  imitation  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  Titus  robbed 
the  Temple  of  its  sacred  utensils,  and  bore  them  away  as  trophies. 
Upon  the  triumphal  arch  at  Rome  that  bears  his  name  may  be 
seen  at  the  present  day  the  sculptured  representation  of  the 
golden  candlestick,  which  was  one  of  the  memorials  of  the 
war. 

In  the  opposite  corner  of  the  empire  a  dangerous  revolt  of  the 
Gauls  was  suppressed,  and  in  the  island  of  Britain  the  Roman 
commander  Agricola  subdued  or  crowded  back  the  native  tribes 
until  he  had  extended  the  frontiers  of  the  empire  into  what  is  now 


COIN    OF   VESPASIAN. 


REIGN  OF   VESPASIAN. 


315 


Scotland.  Then,  as  a  protection  against  the  incursions  of  the 
Caledonians,  the  ancestors  of  the  Scottish  Highlanders,  he  con- 
structed a  line  of  fortresses  from  the  Frith  of  Forth  to  the  Frith 
of  Clyde. 

Vespasian  rebuilt  the  Capitoline  temple,  which  had  been  burned 
during  the  struggle  between  his  soldiers  and  the  adherents  of 
Vitellius  ;  he  constructed  a  new  forum  which  bore  his  own  name  ; 
and  also  began  the  erection  of  the  celebrated  Flavian  amphi- 
theatre, which  was  completed  by  his  successor.  After  a  most 
prosperous  reign  of  ten  years,  Vespasian  died  a.d.  79,  the  first 
emperor  after  Augustus  that  did  not  meet  with  a  violent  death. 


TRIUMPHAL    PROCESSION    FROM    THE   ARCH    OF   TITUS: 
Snowing  the  Seven-branched   Candlestick  and  other  Trophies  from  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem. 


At  the  last  moment  he  requested  his  attendants  to  raise  him  upon 
his  feet  that  he  might  "  die  standing,"  as  befitted  a  Roman 
emperor. 

Reign  of  Titus  (a.d.  79-81). —  In  a  short  reign  of  two  years 


316 


THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 


Titus  won  the  title,  the  "  Delight  of  Mankind."  He  was  un- 
wearied in  acts  of  benevolence  and  in  bestowal  of  favors.  Hav- 
ing let  a  day  slip  by  without  some  act  of  kindness  performed, 
he  is  said  to  have  exclaimed  reproachfully,  "  I  have  lost  a 
day." 

Titus  completed  and  dedicated  the  great  Flavian  amphitheatre 
begun  by  his  father,  Vespasian.  This  vast  structure,  which  accom- 
modated more  than  eighty  thousand  spectators,  is  better  known  as 
the  Colosseum  —  a  name  given  it  either  because  of  its  gigantic 
proportions,  or  on  account  of  a  colossal  statue  of  Nero  which 
happened  to  stand  near  it. 


STREET   IN    POMPEII 


Reconstruction.) 


The  reign  of  Titus,  though  so  short,  was  signalized  by  two  great 
disasters.  The  first  was  a  conflagration  at  Rome,  which  was  almost 
as  calamitous  as  the  Great  Fire  in  the  reign  of  Nero.  The  second 
was  the  destruction,  by  an  eruption  of  Vesuvius,  of  the  Campanian 
cities  of  Pompeii 'and   Herculaneum.       The  cities  were   buried 


DOMITIAN.  317 

beneath  showers  of  cinders,  ashes,  and  streams  of  volcanic  mud. 
Pliny  the  elder,  the  great  naturalist,  venturing  too  near  the  moun- 
tain to  investigate  the  phenomenon,  lost  his  life.1 

Domitian  —  Last  of  the  Twelve  Caesars  (a.d.  81-96).  —  Domi- 
tian,  the  brother  of  Titus,  was  the  last  of  the  line  of  emperors 
known  as  "  the  Twelve  Caesars."  The  title,  however,  was  assumed 
by,  and  is  applied  to,  all  succeeding  emperors  ;  the  sole  reason  that 
the  first  twelve  princes  are  grouped  together  is  because  the  Roman 
biographer  Suetonius  completed  the  lives  of  that  number  only. 

Domitian's  reign  was  an  exact  contrast  to  that  of  his  brother 
Titus.  It  was  one  succession  of  extravagances,  tyrannies,  confis- 
cations, and  murders.  Under  this  emperor  took  place  what  is 
known  in  Church  history  as  "  the  second  persecution  of  the  Chris- 
tians." This  class,  as  well  as  the  Jews,  were  the  special  objects  of 
Domitian's  hatred,  because  they  refused  to  worship  the  statues 
of  himself  which  he  had  set  up  (see  p.  322). 

The  last  of  the  Twelve  Caesars  perished  in  his  own  palace,  and 
by  the  hands  of  members  of  his  own  household.  The  Senate 
ordered  his  infamous  name  to  be  erased  from  the  public  monu- 
ments, and  to  be  blotted  from  the  records  of  the  Roman  state. 

The  Five  Good  Emperors:  Reign  of  Nerva  (a.d.  96-98). — 
The  five  emperors  —  Nerva,  Trajan,  Hadrian,  and  trie  two  An- 
tonines  —  that  succeeded  Domitian  were  elected  by  the  Senate, 
which  during  this  period  assumed  something  of  its  former  weight 
and  influence  in  the  affairs  of  the  empire.  The  wise  and  benefi- 
cent administration  of  the  government  by  these  rulers  secured 
for  them  the  enviable  distinction  of  being  called  "  the  five  good 
emperors."     Nerva  died  after  a  short  reign  of  sixteen  months, 

1  In  the  year  1 713,  sixteen  centuries  after  the  destruction  of  the  cities,  the 
ruins  were  discovered  by  some  persons  engaged  in  digging  a  well,  and  since 
then  extensive  excavations  have  been  made,  which  have  uncovered  a  large 
part  of  Pompeii,  and  revealed  to  us  the  streets,  homes,  theatres,  baths,  shops, 
temples,  and  various  monuments  of  the  ancient  city  —  all  of  which  present  to 
us  a  very  vivid  picture  of  Roman  life  during  the  imperial  period,  eighteen 
hundred  years  ago. 


318 


THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 


and  the  sceptre  passed  into  the  stronger  hands  of  the  able  com- 
mander Trajan,  whom  Nerva  had  previously  made  his  associate  in 
the  government. 

Reign  of  Trajan  (a.d.  98-1 1 7) .  —  Trajan  was  a  native  of  Spain, 
and  a  soldier  by  profession  and  talent.     His  ambition  to  achieve 

military  renown  led  him  to 
undertake  distant  and  impor- 
tant conquests.  It  was  the 
policy  of  Augustus  —  a  policy 
adopted  by  most  of  his  suc- 
cessors—  to  make  the  Dan- 
ube in  Europe  and  the 
Euphrates  in  Asia  the  limits 
of  the  Roman  empire  in 
those  respective  quarters. 
But  Trajan  determined  to 
push  the  frontiers  of  his  do- 
minions beyond  both  these 
rivers,  scorning  to  permit 
Nature  by  these  barriers  to 
mark  out  the  confines  of 
Roman   sovereignty. 

He  crossed  the  Danube 
by  means  of  a  bridge,  the 
foundations  of  which  may 
still  be  seen,  and  subjugated 
the  bold  and  warlike  Dacian 
tribes  lying  behind  that 
stream  —  tribes  that  had 
often  threatened  the  peace 
of  the  empire.  After  cele- 
brating his  victories  in  a 
magnificent  triumph  at  Rome,  Trajan  turned  to  the  East,  led 
his  legions  across  the  Euphrates,  reduced  Armenia,  and  wrested 
from  the  Parthians  most  of  the  territory  which   anciently  formed 


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REIGN  OF  TRAJAN. 


319 


the  heart  of  the  Assyrian  monarchy.  To  Trajan  belongs  the 
distinction  of  extending  the  boundaries  of  the  empire  to  the 
most  distant  points  to  which  Roman  ambition  and  prowess  were 
ever  able  to  push  them. 

But  Trajan  was  something  besides  a  soldier.  He  had  a  taste 
for  literature  :  Juvenal,  Plutarch,  and  the  younger  Pliny  wrote 
under  his  patronage ;  and,  moreover,  as  is  true  of  almost  all 
great  conquerors,  he  had  a  perfect  passion  for  building.  Among 
the  great  works  with  which  he  embellished  the  capital  was  the 
Trajan  Forum.  Here  he  erected  the  celebrated  marble  shaft 
known  as  Trajan's  column.     It  is  one  hundred  and  forty-seven 


BESIEC^'NG   A    DACIAN    CITY.     (From  Trajan's   Column.) 


feet  higlv  and  is  wound  from  base  to  summit  by  a  spiral  band 
of  sculptures,  containing  more  than  twenty-five  thousand  human 
figure's.  The  column  is  nearly  as  perfect  to-day  as  when  reared 
e>$riteen  centuries  ago.  It  was  intended  to  commemorate  the 
ian  conquests  of  Trajan ;  and  its  pictured  sides  are  the  best, 
tfnd  almost  the  only,  record  we  now  possess  of  those  wars. 

Respecting  the  rapid  spread  of  Christianity  at  this  time,  the 

[■  character  of  the  early  professors  of  the  new  faith,  and  the  light 

I  in  which  they  were  viewed  by  the  rulers  of  the  Roman  world,  we 

^have  very  important  evidence  in  a  certain  letter  written  by  Pliny 


320  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 

in  Asia  Minor,  of  which  remote  province  Pliny  was  governor. 
Pliny  speaks  of  the  new  creed  as  a  "  contagious  superstition,  that 
had  seized  not  cities  only,  but  the  lesser  towns  also,  and  the  open 
country."  Yet  he  could  find  no  fault  in  the  converts  to  the  new 
doctrines.  Notwithstanding  this,  however,  because  the  Christians 
steadily  refused  to  sacrifice  to  the  Roman  gods,  he  ordered  many 
to  be  put  to  death  for  their  "  inflexible  obstinacy." 

Trajan  died  a.d.  117,  after  a  reign  of  nineteen  years,  one  of  the 
most  prosperous  and  fortunate  that  had  yet  befallen  the  lot  of  the 
Roman  people. 

Reign  of  Hadrian  (a.d.  i  17-138).  —  Hadrian,  a  kinsman  of 
Trajan,  succeeded  him  in  the  imperial  office.  He  possessed  great 
ability,  and  displayed  admirable  moderation  and  prudence  in  the 
administration  of  the  government.  He  gave  up  the  territory  con- 
quered by  Trajan  in  the  East,  and  made  the  Euphrates  once  more 
the  boundary  of  the  empire  in  that  quarter.  He  also  broke  down 
the  bridge  that  Trajan  had  built  over  the  Danube,  and  made  that 
stream  the  real  frontier  line,  notwithstanding  the  Roman  garrisons 
were  still  maintained  in  Dacia.  Hadrian  saw  plainly  that  Rome 
could  not  safely  extend  any  more  widely  the  frontiers  of  the 
empire.  Indeed,  so  active  and  threatening  were  the  enemies  of 
the  empire  in  the  East,  and  so  daring  and  numerous  had  now 
become  its  barbarian  assailants  of  the  North,  that  there  was  rea- 
son for  the  greatest  anxiety  lest  they  should  break  through  even 
the  old  and  strong  lines  of  the  Danube  and  the  Euphrates,  and 
pour  their  devastating  hordes  over  the  provinces. 

More  than  fifteen  years  of  his  reign  were  spent  by  Hadi'ian  in 
making  tours  of  inspection  through  all  the  different  provinces  of 
the  empire.  He  visited  Britain,  and  secured  the  Roman  posses- 
sions there  against  the  Picts  and  Scots  by  erecting  a  continuous 
wall  across  the  island.  Next  he  journeyed  through  Gaul  ancl 
Spain,  and  then  visited  in  different  tours  all  the  remaining  coun- 
tries bordering  upon  the  Mediterranean.  He  ascended  the  Nile,'  f 
and,  traveller-like,  carved  his  name  upon  the  vocal  Memnon- 
The  cities  which  he  visited  he  decorated  with  temples,  theatre^ 
and  other  monuments. 


THE  ANTONINES.  321 

In  the  year  131,  the  Jews  in  Palestine,  who  had  in  a  measure 
recovered  from  the  blow  Titus  had  given  their  nation,  broke  out 
in  desperate  revolt,  because  of  the  planting  of  a  Roman  colony 
upon  the  almost  desolate  site  of  Jerusalem,  and  the  placing  of 
the  statue  of  Jupiter  in  the  Holy  Temple.  More  than  half  a 
million  of  Jews  perished  in  the  useless  struggle,  and  the  survivors 
were  driven  into  exile  — the  last  dispersion  of  the  race. 

The  latter  years  of  his  reign  Hadrian  passed  at  Rome.  It  was 
here  that  this  princely  builder  erected  his  most  splendid  structures. 
Among  these  was  the  Mole,  or  Mausoleum,  of  Hadrian,  an  immense 
structure  surmounted  by  a  gilded  dome,  erected  on  the  banks  of 
the  Tiber,  and  designed  as  a  tomb  for  himself. 

The  Antonines  (a.d.  138-180).  —  Aurelius  Antoninus,  surnamed 
Pius,  the  adopted  son  of  Hadrian,  and  his  successor,  gave  the 
Roman  empire  an  administration  singularly  pure  and  parental. 
Of  him  it  has  been  said  that  "  he  was  the  first,  and,  saving  his 
colleague  and  successor  Aurelius,  the  only  one  of  the  emperors 
who  devoted  himself  to  the  task  of  government  with  a  single  view 
to  the  happiness  of  his  people."  Throughout  his  long  reign  of 
twenty- three  years,  the  empire  was  in  a  state  of  profound  peace. 
The  attention  of  the  historian  is  attracted  by  no  striking  events, 
which,  as  many  have  not  failed  to  observe,  illustrates  admirably  the 
oft-repeated  maxim,  "  Happy  is  that  people  whose  annals  are  brief." 

Antoninus,  early  in  his  reign,  united  with  himself  in  the  govern- 
ment his  adopted  son  Marcus  Aurelius,  and  upon  the  death  of  the 
former  (a.d.  161)  the  latter  succeeded  quietly  to  his  place  and 
work.  His  studious  habits  won  for  him  the  title  of  "  Philosopher." 
He  belonged  to  the  school  of  the  Stoics,  and  was  a  most  thoughtful 
writer.  His  Meditations  breathe  the  tenderest  sentiments  of  devo- 
tion and  benevolence,  and  make  the  nearest  approach  to  the  spirit 
of  Christianity  of  all  the  writings  of  Pagan  antiquity.  He  estab- 
lished an  Institution,  or  Home,  for  orphan  girls ;  and,  finding  the 
poorer  classes  throughout  Italy  burdened  by  their  taxes  and 
greatly  in  arrears  in  paying  them,  he  caused  all  the  tax-claims  to 
be  heaped  in  the  Forum  and  burned. 


322  THE   ROMAN  EMPIRE. 

The  tastes  and  sympathies  of  Aurelius  would  have  led  him  to 
choose  a  life  passed  in  retirement  and  study  at  the  capital ;  but 
hostile  movements  of  the  Parthians,  and  especially  invasions  of  the 
barbarians  along  the  Rhenish  and  Danubian  frontiers,  called  him 
from  his  books,  and  forced  him  to  spend  most  of  the  latter  years 
of  his  reign  in  the  camp.  The  Parthians,  who  had  violated  their 
treaty  with  Rome,  were  chastised  by  the  lieutenants  of  the  em- 
peror, and  Mesopotamia  again  fell  under  Roman  authority. 

This  war  drew  after  it  a  series  of  terrible  calamities.  The 
returning  soldiers  brought  with  them  the  Asiatic  plague,  which 
swept  off  vast  numbers,  especially  in  Italy,  where  entire  cities  and 
districts  were  depopulated.  In  the  general  distress  and  panic,  the 
superstitious  people  were  led  to  believe  that  it  was  the  new  sect 
of  Christians  that  had  called  down  upon  the  nation  the  anger  of 
the  gods.  Aurelius  permitted  a  fearful  persecution  to  be  instituted 
against  them,  during  which  the  famous  Christian  fathers  and 
bishops,  Justin  Martyr  and  Polycarp,  suffered  death. 

It  should  be  noted  that  the  persecution  of  the  Christians  under 
the  Pagan  emperors,  sprung  from  political  rather  than  religious  mo- 
tives, and  that  this  is  why  we  find  the  names  of  the  best  emperors, 
as  well  as  those  of  the  worst,  in  the  list  of  persecutors.  It  was 
believed  that  the  welfare  of  the  state  was  bound  up  with  the  care- 
ful performance  of  the  rites  of  the  national  worship ;  and  hence, 
while  the  Roman  rulers  were  usually  very  tolerant,  allowing  all 
forms  of  worship  among  their  subjects,  still  they  required  that  men 
of  every  faith  should  at  least  recognize  the  Roman  gods,  and  burn 
incense  before  their  statues.  This  the  Christians  steadily  refused 
to  do.  Their  neglect  of  the  service  of  the  temple,  it  was  believed, 
angered  the  gods,  and  endangered  the  safety  of  the  state,  bringing 
upon  it  drought,  pestilence,  and  every  disaster.  This  was  the 
main  reason  of  their  persecution  by  the  Pagan  emperors. 

But  pestilence  and  persecution  were  both  forgotten  amidst  the 
imperative  calls  for  immediate  help  that  now  came  from  the  North. 
The  barbarians  were  pushing  in  the  Roman  outposts,  and  pouring 
impetuously  over  the  frontiers.     To  the  panic  of  the  plague  was 


ROMAN  EMPERORS. 


323 


added  this  new  terror.  Aurelius  plaoed  himself  at  the  head  of  his 
legions,  and  hurried  beyond  the  Alps.  For  many  years,  amidst 
the  snows  of  winter  and  the  heats  of  summer,  he  strove  to  beat 
back  the  assailants  of  the  empire. 

The  efforts  of  the  devoted  Aurelius  checked  the  inroads  of  the 
barbarians ;  but  he  could  not  subdue  them,  so  weakened  was 
the  empire  by  the  ravages  of  the  pestilence,  and  so  exhausted 
was  the  treasury  from  the  heavy  and  constant  drains  upon  it.  At 
last  his  weak  body  gave  way  beneath  the  hardships  of  his  numer- 
ous campaigns,  and  he  died  in  his  camp  at  Vindobona  (now 
Vienna),  in  the  nineteenth  year  of  his  reign  (a.d.  180). 

The  united  voice  of  the  Senate  and  people  pronounced  him  a 
god,  and  divine  worship  was  accorded  to  his  statue.  Never  was 
Monarchy  so  justified  of  her  children  as  in  the  lives  and  works  of 
the  Antonines.  As  Merivale,  in  dwelling  upon  their  virtues,  very 
justly  remarks,  "  the  blameless  career  of  these  illustrious  princes 
has  furnished  the  best  excuse  for  Caesarism  in  all  after-ages." 


ROMAN    EMPERORS  FROM  AUGUSTUS  TO  MARCUS  AURELIUS. 


(From  31  B.C.  to  a.d.  180.) 


Augustus  reigns         31  B.C.  to  A.D.  14 

Tiberius a.d.  14-37 

Caligula 37-41 

Claudius 4I_54 

Nero 54-68 

Galba 68-69 

Otho 69 

Vitellius 69 

Vespasian 69-79 


Titus a.d.  79-81 

Domitian 81-96 

Nerva 96-98 

Trajan 98-117 

Hadrian 1 17-138 

Antoninus  Pius 138-161 

C  Marcus  Aurelius .  .  .  .  161-180 
s  Verus  associated  with  Au- 

v-     relius 161-169 


The  first  eleven,  in  connection  with  Julius  Caesar,  are  called  the  Twelve 
Caesars.  The  last  five  (excluding  Verus)  are  known  as  the  Five  Good 
Emperors. 


324 


DECLINE  AND  FALL  OF  THE  EMPIRE. 


CHAPTER    XXX. 


DECLINE  AND  FALL   OF  THE   ROMAN  EMPIRE  IN  THE  WEST; 
BEGINNING  OF  THE  GREAT  GERMAN  MIGRATION. 

(a.d.  180-476.) 

Reign  of  Commodus  (a.d.  180-192).  —  Under  the  wise  and  able 
administration  of  "  the  five  good  emperors  "  —  Nerva,  Trajan, 
Hadrian,  and  the  two  Antonines  —  the  Roman  empire  reached 
its  culmination  in  power  and  prosperity ;  and  now,  under  the  en- 
feebling influences  of  vice  and  corruption  within,  and  the  heavy 

blows  of  the  barbarians 
without,  it  begins  to  decline 
rapidly  to  its  fall. 

Commodus,  son  of  Mar- 
cus Aurelius,  and  the  last 
of  the  Antonines,  was  a 
most  unworthy  successor 
of  his  illustrious  father. 
For  three  years,  however, 
surrounded  by  the  able 
generals  and  wise  counsel- 
lors that  the  prudent  ad- 
ministration of  the  preced- 
ing emperors  had  drawn 
to  the  head  of  affairs, 
Commodus  ruled  with 
fairness  and  lenity,  when 
an  unsuccessful  conspiracy  against  his  life  seemed  suddenly  to 
kindle  all  the  slumbering  passions  of  a  Nero.  He  secured  the 
favor  of  the  rabble  with  the  shows  of  the  amphitheatre,  and 
purchased   the  support  of  the   praetorians  with   bribes  and  flat- 


COMMODUS   (as  Hercules). 


"  THE  BARRACK  EMPERORSr  325 

teries.  Thus  he  was  enabled  for  ten  years  to  retain  the  throne, 
while  perpetrating  all  manner  of  cruelties,  and  staining  the  impe- 
rial purple  with  the  most  detestable  debaucheries  and  crimes. 

Commodus  had  a  passion  for  gladiatorial  combats,  and  attired 
in  a  lion's  skin,  and  armed  with  the  club  of  Hercules,  he  valiantly 
set  upon  and  slew  antagonists  arrayed  to  represent  mythological 
monsters,  and  armed  with  great  sponges  for  rocks.  The  Senate, 
so  obsequiously  servile  had  that  body  become,  conferred  upon  him 
the  title  of  the  Roman  Hercules,  and  also  voted  him  the  addi- 
tional surnames  of  Pius  and  Felix,  and  even  proposed  to  change 
the  name  of  Rome  and  call  it  Colonia  Commodiana. 

The  empire  was  finally  relieved  of  the  insane  tyrant  by  some 
members  of  the  royal  household,  who  anticipated  his  designs 
against  themselves  by  putting  him  to  death. 

"The  Barrack  Emperors."  —  For  nearly  a  century  after  the 
death  of  Commodus  (from  a.d.  192  to  284),  the  emperors  were 
elected  by  the  army,  and  hence  the  rulers  for  this  period  have 
been  called  "  the  Barrack  Emperors."  The  character  of  the  pe- 
riod is  revealed  by  the  fact  that  of  the  twenty-five  emperors  who 
mounted  the  throne  during  this  time  all  except  four  came  to  their 
deaths  by  violence.  "  Civil  war,  pestilence,  bankruptcy,  were  all 
brooding  over  the  empire.  The  soldiers  had  forgotten  how  to 
fight,  the  rulers  how  to  govern."  On  every  side  the  barbarians 
were  breaking  into  the  empire  to  rob,  to  murder,  and  to  burn. 

The  Public  Sale  of  the  Empire  (a.d.  193).  —  The  beginning 
of  these  troublous  times  was  marked  by  a  shameful  proceeding  on 
the  part  of  the  praetorians.  Upon  the  death  of  Commodus,  Perti- 
nax,  a  distinguished  senator,  was  placed  on  the  throne ;  but  his 
efforts  to  enforce  discipline  among  the  praetorians  aroused  their 
anger,  and  he  was  slain  by  them  after  a  short  reign  of  only  three 
months.  These  soldiers  then  gave  out  notice  that  they  would  sell 
the  empire  to  the  highest  bidder.  It  was,  accordingly,  set  up  for 
sale  at  the  praetorian  camp,  and  struck  off  to  Didius  Julianus,  a 
thy  senator,  who  gave  giooo  to  each  of  the  12,000  soldiers 
at  this  time  composing  the  guard.  So  the  price  of  the  empire  was 
about  $12,000,000. 


326  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

But  these  turbulent  and  insolent  soldiers  at  the  capital  of  the 
empire  were  not  to  have  things  entirely  their  own  way.  As  soon 
as  th©  news  of  the  disgraceful  transaction  reached  the  legions  on 
the  frontiers,  they  rose  as  a  single  man  in  indignant  revolt.  Each 
of  the  three  armies  that  held  the  Euphrates,  the  Rhine,  and  the 
Danube,  proclaimed  its  favorite  commander  emperor.  The  leader 
of  the  Danubian  troops  was  Septimius  Severus,  a  man  of  great 
energy  and  force  of  character.  He  knew  that  there  were  other 
competitors  for  the  throne,  and  that  the  prize  would  be  his  who 
first  seized  it.  Instantly  he  set  his  veterans  in  motion  and  was 
soon  at  Rome.  The  praetorians  were  no  match  for  the  trained 
legionaries  of  the  frontiers,  and  did  not  even  attempt  to  defend 
their  emperor,  who  was  taken  prisoner  and  put  to  death  after  a 
reign  of  sixty-five  days. 

Reign  of  Septimius  Severus  (a.d.  193-21 1).  —  One  of  the  first 
acts  of  Severus  was  to  organize  a  new  body-guard  of  50,000 
legionaries,  to  take  the  place  of  the  unworthy  praetorians,  whom, 
as  a  punishment  for  the  insult  they  had  offered  to  the  Roman 
state,  he  disbanded,  and  banished  from  the  capital,  and  forbade 
to  approach  within  a  hundred  miles  of  its  walls.  He  next  crushed 
his  two  rival  competitors,  and  was  then  undisputed  master  of  the 
empire.  He  put  to  death  forty  senators  for  having  favored  his 
late  rivals,  and  completely  destroyed  the  power  of  their  body. 
Committing  to  the  prefect  of  the  new  praetorian  guard  the  man- 
agement of  affairs  at  the  capital,  Severus  passed  the  greater  part 
of  his  long  and  prosperous  reign  upon  the  frontiers.  At  one  time 
he  was  chastising  the  Parthians  beyond  the  Euphrates,  and  at 
another,  pushing  back  the  Caledonian  tribes  from  the  Hadrian  wall 
in  the  opposite  corner  of  his  dominions.  Finally,  in  Britain,  in 
his  camp  at  York,  death  overtook  him. 

Reign  of  Caracalla  (a.d.  21 1-2 17).  —  Severus  conferred  the 
empire  upon  his  two  sons,  Caracalla  and  Geta.  Caracalla  mur- 
dered his  brother,  and  then  ordered  Papinian,  the  celebrated 
jurist,  to  make  a  public  argument  in  vindication  of  the  fratricide. 
-When  that  great  lawyer  refused,  saying  that  "  it  was  easier  to  com- 


REIGN  OF  CARACALLA. 


327 


mit  such  a  crime  than  to  justify  it,"  he  put  him  to  death.  Thou- 
sands fell  victims  to  his  senseless  rage.  Driven  by  remorse  and 
fear,  he  fled  from  the  capital,  and  wandered  about  the  most  dis- 
tant provinces.  At  Alexandria,  on  account  of  some  uncomplimen- 
tary remarks  by  the  citizens  upon  his  appearance,  he  ordered  a 
general  massacre.  Finally,  after  a  reign  of  six  years,  the  monster 
was  slain  in  a  remote  corner  of  Syria. 

Caracalla's  sole  political  act  of  real  importance  was  the  bestowal 
of  citizenship  upon  all  the  free  inhabitants  of  the  empire ;  and 
this  he  did,  not 
to  give  them  a 
just  privilege, 
but  that  he 
might  collect 
from  them  cer- 
tain special 
taxes  which 
only  Roman 
citizens  had  to 
pay.  B  e  f  o  r  e 
the  reign  of 
Caracalla  it  was 
only  particular 
classes  of  sub- 
jects, or  the  in- 
habitants of  some  particular  city  or  province,  that,  as  a  mark  of 
special  favor,  had,  from  time  to  time,  been  admitted  to  the  rights 
of  citizenship  (see  p.  280).  By  this  wholesale  act  of  Caracalla,  the 
entire  population  of  the  empire  was  made  Roman,  at  least  in  name 
and  nominal  privilege.  "  The  city  had  become  the  world,  or,  viewed 
from  the  other  side,  the  world  had  become  the  city"  (Merivale). 

Reign  of  Alexander  Severus  (a.d.  222-235). — Severus  restored 
the  virtues  of  the  Age  of  the  Antonines.  His  administration  was 
pure  and  energetic ;  but  he  strove  in  vain  to  resist  the  corrupt 
and  downward  tendencies  of  the  times.     He  was  assassinated, 


CARACALLA. 


328 


DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF   THE  EMPIRE. 


after  a  reign  of  fourteen  years,  by  his  seditious  soldiers,  who  were 
angered  by  his  efforts  to  reduce  them  to  discipline.  They  invested 
with  the  imperial  purple  an  obscure  officer  named  Maximin,  a 
Thracian  peasant,  whose  sole  recommendation  for  this  dignity  was 
his  gigantic  stature  and  his  great  strength  of  limbs.  Rome  had 
now  sunk  to  the  lowest  possible  degradation.  We  may  pass  rapidly 
over  the  next  fifty  years  of  the  empire. 

The  Thirty  Tyrants  (a.d.  251-268).  —  Maximin  was  followed 
swiftly  by  Gordian,  Philip,  and  Decius,  and  then  came  what  is 


TRIUMPH    OF   SAPOR    OVER    VALERIAN. 

called  the  "Age  of  the  Thirty  Tyrants."  The  imperial  sceptre 
being  held  by  weak  emperors,  there  sprang  up  in  every  part  of 
the  empire,  competitors  for  the  throne  —  several  rivals  frequently 
appearing  in  the  field  at  the  same  time.  The  barbarians  pressed 
upon  all  the  frontiers,  and  thrust  themselves  into  all  the  provinces. 
The  empire  seemed  on  the  point  of  falling  to  pieces.1  But  a 
fortunate  succession  of  five  good  emperors  —  Claudius,  Aurelian, 

1  It  was  during  this  period  that  the  Emperor  Valerian  (a.d.  253-260),  in  a 
battle  with  the  Persians  before  Edessa,  in  Mesopotamia,  was  defeated  and 
taken  prisoner  by  Sapor,  the  Persian  king.  A  large  rock  tablet  (see  cut 
above),  still  to  be  seen  near  the  Persian  town  of  Shiraz,  is  believed  to  com- 
memorate the  triumph  of  Sapor  over  the  unfortunate  emperor. 


THE  FALL  OF  PALMYRA.  329 

Tacitus,  Probus,  and  Carus  (a.d.  268-284)  — restored  for  a  time 
the  ancient  boundaries,  and  again  forced  together  into  some  sort 
of  union  the  fragments  of  the  shattered  state. 

The  Fall  of  Palmyra. — The  most  noted  of  the  usurpers  of 
authority  in  the  provinces  during  the  period  of  anarchy  of  which 
we  have  spoken,  was  Odenatus,  Prince  of  Palmyra,  a  city  occupy- 
ing an  oasis  in  the  midst  of  the  Syrian  Desert,  midway  between 
the  Mediterranean  and  the  Euphrates.  In  gratitude  for  the  aid 
he  had  rendered  the  Romans  against  the  Parthians,  the  Senate 
had  bestowed  upon  him  titles  and  honors.  When  the  empire 
began  to  show  signs  of  weakness  and  approaching  dissolution, 
Odenatus  conceived  the  ambitious  project  of  erecting  upon  its 
ruins  in  the  East  a  great  Palmyrian  kingdom.  Upon  his  death, 
his  wife,  Zenobia,  succeeded  to  his  authority  and  to  his  ambitions. 
This  famous  princess  claimed  descent  from  Cleopatra,  and  it  is 
certain  that  in  the  charms  of  personal  beauty  she  was  the  rival  of 
the  Egyptian  queen.  Boldly  assuming  the  title  of  "  Queen  of  the 
East,"  she  bade  defiance  to  the  emperor  of  Rome.  Aurelian 
marched  against  her,  defeated  her  armies,  and  carried  her  a  cap- 
tive to  Italy  (273  B.C.).  After  having  been  led  in  golden  chains 
in  the  triumphal  procession  of  Aurelian,  the  queen  was  given  a 
beautiful  villa  in  the  vicinity  of  Tibur,  where,  surrounded  by  her 
children,  she  passed  the  remainder  of  her  checkered  life. 

The  ruins  of  Palmyra  are  among  the  most  interesting  remains 
of  (iraeco-Roman  civilization  in  the  East. 

Reign  of  Diocletian  (a.d.  284-305).  — The  reign  of  Diocletian 
marks  an  important  era  in  Roman  history.  Up  to  this  time  the 
imperial  government  had  been  more  or  less  carefully  concealed 
under  the  forms  and  names  of  the  old  republic.  The  government 
now  became  an  unveiled  and  absolute  monarchy.  Diocletian's 
reforms,   though   radical,  were   salutary,  and    infused    such  fresh 

I  vitality  into  the  frame  of  the  dying  state  as  to  give  it  a  new  lease 
of  life  for  another  term  of  nearly  two  hundred  years. 
He  determined  to  divide  the  numerous  and  increasing  cares  of 


330 


DECLINE  AND  FA  1 1    OF   Till:    EMPIRE, 


one  in  the  East  and  the  other  in  the  West.  In  pursuance  of  this 
plan,  he  chose  as  a  colleague  a  companion  soldier,  Maximian, 
upon  whom  he  conferred  the  title  of  Augustus.     After  a  few  years, 

finding  the  cares  of  the  co-sovereignty 
still  too  heavy,  each  sown 
ciated  with  himself  an  assistant,  who 
took  the  title  of  Cassar,  and  was  con- 
sidered the  son  and  heir  of  the  em- 
peror. There  were  thus  two  Augusti 
ami  two  Caesars.  Milan,  in  Italy,  be- 
came the  capital  and  residence  o( 
Maximian;  while  Nicomedia,  in  Asia 
Minor,  became  the  seat  of  the  court 
of  Diocletian.  The  Augusti  took 
charge  of  the  countries  near  their  re- 
spective capitals,  while  the  younger 
and  more  active  (\csars  were  assigned 
the  government  of  the  more  distant 
and  turbulent  provinces.  The  vigor- 
government  in  every  quarter  of  the 
The  authority  of  each  of  the  rulers  was 
supreme  within  the  territory  allotted  him  ;  but  all  acknowledged 
Diocletian  as  "  the  father  and  head  of  the  state." 

The  most  serious  drawback  to  the  system  of  government  thus 
instituted  was  the  heavy  expense  incident  to  the  maintenance  o( 
four  courts  with  their  trains  of  officers  and  dependants.  The  taxes 
became  unendurable,  husbandry  ceased,  and  large  masses  of  the 
population  were  reduced  almost  to  starvation. 

While  the  changes  made  in  the  government  have  rendered  the 
name  of  Diocletian  famous  in  the  political  history  of  the  Roman 
state,  the  cruel  persecutions  which  he  ordered  against  the  Chris- 
tians have  made  his  name  in  an  equal  degree  infamous  in  ecclesi- 
astical annals;  for  it  was  during  this  reign  that  the  tenth  —  the 
last  and  severest — of  the  persecutions  of  the  Church  took  place. 
By  an  imperial  decree  the  churches  of  the  Christians  were  ordered 


DIOCLETIAN. 


ous  administration    of  the 

empire  was  thus  secured. 


KF.fGN  OF  DIOCLETIAN. 


331 


to  be  torn  down,  and  they  themselves  were  outlawed.  For  tetf 
-  the  fugitives  wore  hunted  in  forest  and  cave.  The  victims 
were  burned,  were  cast  to  the  wild  beasts  in  the  amphitheatre  — 
were  put  to  death  by  every  torture  and  in  every  mode  that  ingen- 
ious cruelty  could  devise.  But  nothing  could  shake  the  constancy 
of  their  faith.  They  courted  the  death  that  seemed  them,  as  they 
firmly  believed,  immediate  entrance  upon  an  existence  of  unending 
happiness.  The  exhibition  of  de- 
votion and  constancy  shown  by 
the  martyrs  won  multitudes  to  the 
persecuted  faith. 

It  was  during  tins  and  the  vari- 
ous other  persecutions  that  vexed  !- 
the    Church   in  the   second   and 
third  centuries  thai  the  Christians 

sought  refuge  in  the  Catacombs, 
those  vast  subterranean  galleries 
and  chambers  under  the  city  of 
Rome.      1  [ert  the  Christians  lived 

and  buried  their  dead,  and  on  the 

wall>  of  the   chambers   sketched 

rude  symbols  of  their  hope  and  faith.     It  was  in  the  darkness  of 

these  subterranean  abodes  thai  christian  art  had  its  beginnings. 

After  a  prospetOUS  reign  o\  twenty  years,  becoming  weary  of 
the  cares  n\  state.  1  hoeletian  abdicated  the  throne,  and  forced  or 
induced  his  colleague  Maximian  also  to  lay  down  his  authority 
on  the  same  day.  (ialerius  and  t/onstantius  were,  bv  this  act, 
advanced  tO  the  purple  and  made  Augusti  ;  and  two  new  associates 
appointed  as  CSBSaia.  Dunk-ban.  having  enjoyed  the  ex- 
treme sati>ta<  ti.»u  dI  awing  die  imperial  authority  quietly  and  suc- 
cessfully transmitted  by  his  system,  without  the  dictation  of  the 
insolent  pi  cnuuiis  or  the  interference  of  the  turbulent  legion- 
aries, now  retired  to  his  country  seat  at  Salona,  on  the  eastern 
Shore  of  the  Adriatic,  ami  there  devoted  himself  to  rural  pursuits. 
It    is   related   that,  when    Maxunun  wrote   him   urging  him  to  en- 


CHRIST  AS  THE  GOOD  SHEPHERD. 
(From  th«  Catacombs.) 


332  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

cieavor,  with  him,  to  regain  the  power  they  had  laid  aside,  he  re- 
plied :  "  Were  you  but  to  come  to  Salona  and  see  the  vegetables 
which  I  raise  in  my  garden  with  my  own  hands,  you  would  no 
longer  talk  to  me  of  empire." 

Reign  of  Constantine  the  Great  (a.d.  306-337) ;  the  Empire 
becomes  Christian.  —  Galerius  and  Constantius  had  reigned  to- 
gether only  one  year,  when  the  latter  died  at  York,  in  Britain ; 
and  his  soldiers,  disregarding  the  rule  of  succession  as  determined 
by  the  system  of  Diocletian,  proclaimed  his  son  Constantine  em- 
peror. Six  competitors  for  the  throne  arose  in  different  quarters. 
For  eighteen  years  Constantine  fought  to  gain  supremacy.  At  the 
end  of  that  time  every  rival  was  crushed,  and  he  was  the  sole  ruler 
of  the  Roman  world. 

Constantine  was  the  first  Christian  emperor.  He  was  con- 
verted to  the  new  religion  —  such  is  the  legend  —  by  seeing  in  the 
heavens,  during  one  of  his  campaigns  against  his  rivals,  a  luminous 
cross  with  this  inscription:  "With  this  sign  you  will  conquer." 
He  made  the  cross  the  royal  standard ;  and  the  Roman  legions 
now  for  the  first  time  marched  beneath  the  emblem  of  Christianity. 

By  a  decree  issued  from  Milan  a.d.  313,  Christianity  was  made 
in  effect  the  state  religion ;  but  all  other  forms  of  worship  were 
tolerated.  With  the  view  of  harmonizing  the  different  sects  that 
had  sprung  up  among  the  Christians,  and  to  settle  the  controversy 
between  the  Arians  and  the  Athanasians  respecting  the  nature  of 
Christ,  —  the  former  denied  his  equality  with  God  the  Father,  — 
Constantine  called  the  first  (Ecumenical,  or  General  Council  of  the 
Church,  at  Nicaea,  a  town  of  Asia  Minor,  a.d.  325.  Arianism  was 
denounced,  and  a  formula  of  Christian  faith  adopted,  which  is 
known  as  the  Nicene  Creed. 

After  the  recognition  of  Christianity,  the  most  important  act  of 
Constantine  was  the  selection  of  Byzantium,  on  the  Bosporus,  as 
the  new  capital  of  the  empire.  One  reason  which  led  the  em- 
peror to  choose  this  site  in  preference  to  Rome  was  the  ungra- 
cious conduct  towards  him  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  latter  city, 
because  he  had  abandoned  the  worship  of  the  old  national  deities. 


REIGN  OF  CONSTANTINE    THE    GREAT.  333 

But  there  were  political  reasons  for  such  a  change.  Through  the 
Eastern  conquests  of  Rome,  the  centre  of  the  population,  wealth, 
and  culture  of  the  empire  had  shifted  eastward.  The  West  — 
Gaol,  Britain,  Spain  —  was  rude  and  barbarous;  the  East  — 
Egypt,  Syria,  Asia  Minor  —  was  the  abode  of  ancient  civilizations 
from  which  Rome  was  proud  to  trace  her  origin.  Constantine 
was  not  the  first  to  entertain  the  idea  of  seeking  in  the  East  a 
new  centre  for  the  Roman  world.  The  Italians  were  inflamed 
against  the  first  Cjesar  by  the  report  that  he  intended  to  restore 
Ilium,  the  cradle  of  the  Roman  race,  and  make  that  the  capital  of 
the  empire. 

Constantine  organized  at  Byzantium  a  new  Senate,  while  that  at 
Rome  sank  to  the  obscure  position  of  the  council  of  a  provincial 
municipality.  Multitudes  eagerly  thronged  to  the  new  capital, 
and  almost  in  a  night  the  little  colony  grew  into  an  imperial  city. 
In  honor  of  the  emperor  its  name  was  changed  to  Constantinople, 
the  "  City  of  Constantine."  Hereafter  the  eyes  of  the  world  were 
directed  towards  the  Bosporus  instead  of  the  Tiber. 

To  aid  in  the  administration  of  the  government,  Constantine 
laid  out  the  empire  into  four  great  divisions,  called  prefectures 
(see  map),  which  were  subdivided  into  thirteen  dioceses,  and 
these  again  into  one  hundred  and  sixteen  provinces, 

The  character  of  Constantine  has  been  greatly  eulogized  by 
Christian  writers,  while  pagan  historians  very  naturally  painted  it 
in  dark  colors.  It  is  probable  that  he  embraced  Christianity,  not 
entirely  from  conviction,  but  partly  from  political  motives.  As 
the  historian  Hodgkin  puts  it,  "  He  was  half  convinced  of  the 
truth  of  Christianity,  and  wholly  convinced  of  the  policy  of  em- 
bracing it."  In  any  event,  Constantine's  religion  was  a  strange 
mixture  of  the  old  and  the  new  faith  :  on  his  medals  the  Christian 
cross  is  held  by  the  pagan  deity,  Victory.  In  his  domestic  rela- 
tions he  was  tyrannical  and  cruel.  He  died  in  the  thirty-first  year 
of  his  reign,  leaving  his  kingdom  to  his  three  sons,  Constans, 
Constantius,  and  Constantine. 

Reign  of  Julian  the  Apostate  (a.i>.  361-363).  —  The  parcel- 


334  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

ling  out  of  the  empire  by  Constantine  among  his  sons  led  to 
strife  and  wars,  which,  at  the  end  of  sixteen  years,  left  Constan- 
tius  master  of  the  whole.  He  reigned  as  sole  emperor  for  about 
eight  years,  engaged  in  ceaseless  warfare  with  German  tribes  in  the 
West  and  with  the  Persians x  in  the  East.  Constantius  was  fol- 
lowed by  his  cousin  Julian,  who  was  killed  while  in  pursuit  of  the 
troops  of  Sapor,  king  of  the  Persians  (a.d.  363). 

Julian  is  called  the  Apostate  because  he  abandoned  Christianity 
and  labored  to  restore  the  pagan  faith.  In  his  persecution  of 
the  Christians,  however,  he  could  not  resort  to  the  old  means  — 
"  the  sword,  the  fire,  the  lions ; "  for,  under  the  softening  influ- 
ences of  the  very  faith  he  sought  to  extirpate,  the  Roman  world 
had  already  learned  a  gentleness  and  humanity  that  rendered 
impossible  the  renewal  of  the  Neronian  and  Diocletian  persecu- 
tions. Julian's  weapons  were  sophistry  and  ridicule,  in  the  use  of 
which  he  was  a  master.  To  degrade  the  Christians,  and  place 
them  at  a  disadvantage  in  controversy,  he  excluded  them  from 
the  schools  of  logic  and  rhetoric. 

Furthermore,  to  cast  discredit  upon  the  predictions  of  the 
Scriptures,  Julian  determined  to  rebuild  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem, 
which  the  Christians  contended  could  not  be  restored  because 
of  the  prophecies  against  it.  He  actually  began  excavations,  but 
his  workmen  were  driven  in  great  panic  from  the  spot  by  terrific 
explosions  and  bursts  of  flame.  The  Christians  regarded  the 
occurrence  as  miraculous ;  and  Julian  himself,  it  is  certain,  was  so 
dismayed  by  it  that  he  desisted  from  the  undertaking.2 

It  was  in  vain  that  the  apostate  emperor  labored  to  uproot  the 

1  The  great  Parthian  empire,  which  had  been  such  a  formidable  antago- 
nist of  Rome,  was,  after  an  existence  of  five  centuries,  overthrown  (a.d.  226) 
by  a  revolt  of  the  Persians,  and  the  New  Persian,  or  Sassanian  monarchy 
established.  This  empire  lasted  till  the  country  was  overrun  by  the  Saracens 
in  the  seventh  century  a.d. 

2  The  explosions  which  so  terrified  the  workmen  of  Julian  are  supposed  to 
have  been  caused  by  accumulations  of  gases  —  similar  to  those  that  so  fre- 
quently occasion  accidents  in  mines  —  in  the  subterranean  chambers  of  the 
Temple  foundations. 


VALENTINIAN  AND    VALENS. 


335 


new  faith ;  for  the  purity  of  its  teachings,  the  universal  and  eternal 
character  of  its  moral  precepts,  had  given  it  a  name  to  live. 
Equally  in  vain  were  his  efforts  to  restore  the  worship  of  the  old 
Grecian  and  Roman  divinities.  Polytheism  was  a  transitional  form 
of  religious  belief  which  the  world  had  now  outgrown  :  Great  Pan 
was  dead. 

The  disabilities  under  which  Julian  had  placed  the  Christians 
were  removed  by  his  successor  Jovian  (a.d.  363-4),  and  the 
Christian  worship  was  re-established. 


GERMANS   CROSSING  THE   RHINE.      (Drawing  by  Alphonse  de  Neuville.) 

Valentinian  and  Valens.  — Upon  the  death  of  Jovian,  Valen- 
tinian,  the  commander  of  the  imperial  guard,  was  elected  emperor 
by  a  council  of  the  generals  of  the  army  and  the  ministers  of  the 
court.  He  appointed  his  brother  Valens  as  his  associate  in  office, 
and  assigned  to  him  the  Eastern  provinces,  while  reserving  for  him- 
self the  Western.  He  set  up  his  own  court  at  Milan,  while  his 
brother  established  his  residence  at  Constantinople. 

The  Movements  of  the  Barbarians. — The  reigns  of  Valen- 
tinian and  Valens  were  signalized  by  threatening   movements  of 


336  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF  THE   /'.AfPfRE. 

the  barbarian  tribes,  that  now,  almost  at  the  same  moment,  began 
to  press  with  redoubled  energy  against  all  the  harriers  of  the  en 
pire.  The  Alemanni  (Cil'llimil)  crossed  the  Rhine  —  sometime! 
swarming  over  the  river  on  the  winter's  Ice  and,  before  pursuit 
could  be  made,  eseaped  with  their  booty  into  the  depths  of"  the 
German  forests.  The  Saxons,  pirates  of  the  northern  seas,  who 
issued  from  the  mouth  of  the  Elbe,  ravaged  the  <  oastfl  Oi  <  raul  and 
Britain,  even  pushing  their  light  skiffs  far  up  the  riven  and  creekfl 
of  those  countries,  and  carrying  spoils  from  the  inland  cities.  In 
Britain,  the  Rets  broke  through  the  Wall  of  Antoninus,  and 
wrested  almost  the  entire  island  from  the  hands  of  the  Romans. 
In  Africa,  the  Moorish  and  other  tribes,  issuing  from  the  ravines 
of  the  Atlas  Mountains  and  swarming  from  the  deserts  of  the 
south,  threatened  to  obliterate  the  last  trace  of  Roman  civilization 
occupying  the  narrow  belt  of  fertile  territory  skirting  the  sea. 

The  barbarian  tide  of  invasion  seemed  thus  on  the  point  of 
overwhelming  the  empire  in  the  West  ;  but  for  twelve  years  Val- 
entmian  defended  with  signal  ability  and  energy,  not  only  his  own 
territories,  but  aided  with  arms  and  counsel  his  weaker  brother 
Valens  in  the  defence  <>f  his.  I'pon  the  death  of  Valentmian,  Ins 
son  Gratian  sueeeeded  to  his  authority  (a.d.  375). 

The  Goths  cross  the  Danube. —  The  year  following  the  death 
of  Valentinian,  an  event  of  the  greatest  Importance  occurred  in 

the  East.     The  Visigoths  (Western  Goths )  dwelling  north  of  the 
Rower  Danube,  who  had  often  in  hostile   bands   CTOSSed    tli.it    river 
to  war  against  the  Roman  emperors,  now  appeared  as  suppli 
in  vast  multitudes  upon  its  banks.     They  said  that  a  terrible  1 
whom  they  were  powerless  to  withstand,  had  invaded  their  t 
tories,  and   Spared    neither   their   homes   nor   their   lives.     They 
begged  permi.,1011  of  the  Romans  to  cross  the  river  and  settle  in 
Thrace,  and   promised,  should    this   request   be   granted,  ever  to 
remain  the  grateful  and  firm  alius  of  the  Roman  state. 

Valens  consented  to  grant  their  petition  on  condition  that  they 

should   surrender  their  amis,  give   up  their  children  as   I 

and  all  be  bapti/ed    in   the   Christian  faith.      Their  terror  and  de- 


337 

span  led  ilicm  to  assent  to  tin  -.<•  .  onditions.      So  the  entire  nation, 

numbering  om   onlHioa  souli,—  eovntmf,  Mm,  women,  tad  <hil- 
dren,  —  were  Allowed  to  <  i on  the  rivei     Several  dtyi  And  nlghli 

u<l.       .  mii. nine. t      III     the-      Ii.iiim|ui|  I     ol     the     vast      multitudes.         Ihe 

will,  i  ,  ..!    III.     tin,.    ,    hken    the    |...  .-..;•<     t,.    lli.it    ot    the     Hellespont 
l»\    the    hir  I'.  -'I    \ei  \<-.. 

Mi.    <  ii<  n;\   that    had   so   terrified   the   Coths  were   the    Huns,  a 

in. ui   it..  II-.    i.k  .     ..I    hen  <     n. .in.i. Ik      h..i.<  men,    lli.it    two    <  entu 
and  more  before  the  Christian   era  were   roving  the  deserts  north  oj 
the   Cleat    Wall  ..I  I  'hma   i  ■  <  .    p     i  ■;  I  \l  iei  .it  me    liom   tl)    I 

lll.\    mo\ed    -i.iuh     t..    the    we-.l.  a.  l.iv,    the   -teal    pl.mi-,    ,,|    <  Villi  al 
and,  altei   w.mdei  mK  •,.  \  .-ml   <  entm  n-,,  appeared    in    Knrop. 

I  he\      |„  I.MiLM  ,|     lo    .1     dill.  I.llt     1. 1,  e     (  tilt       I  til  .1 1 1 1. 1 1 1  I     from      ..II      ihe 

othc-i    Knropean    In  he-,  with  which  we  have  been  so  lai  rum  erned 

lh<  I  were  hideous,  then    hOS<       l)<  \l\g    ll.ill.  n<  d.  and   llien 

.   .  i-a  li-  .1.  !<•  i. aid.  i    then    appearance    more    frightful,  as  well 

..  .   In   piewnt    them.'Wlh    ..I     a     I.e. lid.        Iweil     the     I  i.ll  I  Ml  OllS    CotltS 

.  .ill.  d    III.  in   •'  l...il,.in.il. 

ii.  .  I)    had    the    fugitive    \  i   i^oths    l><  en    re.  .  ived    within    the 

Umlu  "i  tin-  empire  before  a  Urge  company  of  m<  h  kmtmen,  me 

i.    also    .Iriven    ti.un    then    homei    by 

Ihe    -.ime    Itlt  1 1  II:  i    rOWdl  -I    tO    ll   I  I     Ihe    I  >.llltlU\    ..lid 

pleaded    that    the\     might     I  .<•     all.  .wed,    a-,    then     «  otintrvinen     had 
Im  i  n,    to   |ila.  <•    the    riv<  i    between    them:  elves   and   theii    dread<  d 

Tail     \  alei.    ,     he.  ..mine     alaii.i.  d    at     the     pi<     i  u.  e    .  ,|     SO 

mans      l.ail.aiian  .     willmi     In  ,      ! .1     then     n  ,pn 

Whereupon    they,    di.a. hue    the    fierce    and    implacable    foe    behind 
more  thin  the  wrath  ol   the  Roman  emperoi    in   liont,  «  ioV,ed  the 

will,    aim-,    in    Ih.  n     hand |         At     tin  ,     i.....n.  ill     ll.e     \  i    tgOthij 

revolt,  joined    tlnii    kinsmen   that    were    jusl    now   fun  Ing 

lh<      pa      .ip     "I     the     ll.iii.ilu   ,    and     began     lo     I.U.ijt     the     I  l.lllttt  H.lll 
pi< ah,.  .             \    ,1.  n      -I.     p  at.  In  d     .will    BR  I"    I  .i  Hi. m   in   Ihe 

W  -     I  i: miii   I   Ih.     |..<    he   had  ■...  mipin.l.  ntly 

•dmitttd  within  tin    1 1 1  ,,|   ih,    <  inpii. 

Theodoiiui  the  OreAt  (a,i».  $79-395)       ciatm.  wm  hurrj 


338  DECLINE  AND  FALL   OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

to  the  help  of  his  colleague  Valens,  when  news  of  his  defeat  and 
death  at  the  hands  of  the  barbarians  was  brought  to  him,  and  he  at 
once  appointed  as  his  associate  Theodosius,  known  afterwards  as 
the  Great,  and  entrusted  him  with  the  government  of  the  Eastern 
provinces.  Theodosius,  by  wise  and  vigorous  measures,  quickly 
reduced  the  Goths  to  submission.  Vast  multitudes  of  the  Visigoths 
were  settled  upon  the  waste  lands  of  Thrace,  while  the  Ostrogoths 
were  scattered  in  various  colonies  in  different  regions  of  Asia  Minor. 
The  Goths  became  allies  of  the  Emperor  of  the  East,  and  more 
than  40,000  of  these  warlike  barbarians,  who  were  destined  to  be 
the  subverters  of  the  empire,  were  enlisted  in  the  imperial  legions. 

While  Theodosius  was  thus  composing  the  East,  the  West, 
through  the  jealous  rivalries  of  different  competitors  for  the  con- 
trol of  the  government,  had  fallen  into  great  disorder.  Theodosius 
twice  interposed  to  right  affairs,  and  then  took  the  government 
into  his  own  hands.  For  four  months  he  ruled  as  sole  monarch 
of  the  empire. 

Final  Division  of  the  Empire  (a.d.  395).  —  The  Roman  world 
was  now  united  for  the  last  time  under  a  single  master.  Just 
before  his  death,  Theodosius  divided  the  empire  between  his  two 
sons,  Arcadius  and  Honorius,  assigning  the  former,  who  was  only 
eighteen  years  of  age,  the  government  of  the  East,  and  giving  the 
latter,  a  mere  child  of  eleven,  the  sovereignty  of  the  West.  This 
was  the  final  partition  of  the  Roman  empire  —  the  issue  of  that 
growing  tendency,  which  we  have  observed  in  its  immoderately  ex- 
tended dominions,  to  break  apart.  The  separate  histories  of  the 
East  and  the  West  now  begin. 

The  Eastern  Empire.  —  The  story  of  the  fortunes  of  the  Em- 
pire in  the  East  need  not  detain  us  long  at  this  point  of  our 
history.  This  monarchy  lasted  over  a  thousand  years  —  from 
the  accession  to  power  of  Arcadius,  a.d.  395,  to  the  capture  of 
Constantinople  by  the  Turks,  a.d.  1453.  It  will  thus  be  seen 
that  the  greater  part  of  its  history  belongs  to  the  mediaeval  period. 
Up  to  the  time  of  the  overthrow  of  the  Empire  in  the  West,  the 
sovereigns  of  the  East  were  engaged  almost  incessantly  in  sup- 


FIRST  INVASION  OF  ITAIY.  339 

pressing  uprisings  of  their  Gothic  allies  or  mercenaries,  or  in  re- 
pelling invasions  of  the  Huns  and  the  Vandals.  Frequently  during 
this  period,  in  order  to  save  their  own  territories,  the  Eastern  em- 
perors, by  dishonorable  inducements,  persuaded  the  barbarians  to 
direct  their  ravaging  expeditions  against  the  provinces  of  the  West. 

Last  Days  of  the  Empire  in  the  West. 

First  Invasion  of  Italy  by  Alaric.  —  Only  a  few  years  had 
elapsed  after  the  death  of  the  great  Theodosius,  before  the  bar- 
barians were  trooping  in  vast  hordes  through  all  the  regions  of  the 
West.  First,  from  Thrace  and  Mcesia  came  the  Visigoths,  led  by 
the  great  Alaric.  They  poured  through  the  Pass  of  Thermopylae, 
and  devastated  almost  the  entire  peninsula  of  Greece ;  but,  being 
driven  from  that  country  by  Stilicho,  the  renowned  Vandal  gen- 
eral of  Honorius,  they  crossed  the  Julian  Alps,  and  spread  terror 
throughout  all  Italy.  Stilicho  followed  the  barbarians  cautiously, 
and,  attacking  them  at  a  favorable  moment,  inflicted  a  terrible  and 
double  defeat  upon  them  at  Pollentia  and  Verona  (a.d.  402-403). 
The  captured  camp  was  found  filled  with  the  spoils  of  Thebes, 
Corinth,  and  Sparta.  Gathering  the  remnants  of  his  shattered 
army,  Alaric  forced  his  way  with  difficulty  through  the  defiles  of 
the  Alps,  and  escaped. 

Last  Triumph  at  Rome  (a.d.  404).  —  A  terrible  danger  had 
been  averted.  All  Italy  burst  forth  in  expressions  of  gratitude  and 
joy.  The  days  of  the  Cimbri  and  Teutones  were  recalled,  and  the 
name  of  Stilicho  was  pronounced  with  that  of  Marius.  A  magnifi- 
cent triumph  at  Rome  celebrated  the  victory  and  the  deliverance. 
It  was  the  last  triumph  that  Rome  ever  saw.  Three  hundred 
times  —  such  is  asserted  to  be  the  number  —  the  Imperial  City 
had  witnessed  the  triumphal  procession  of  her  victorious  generals, 
celebrating  conquests  in  all  quarters  of  the  world. 

Last  Gladiatorial  Combat  of  the  Amphitheatre. — The  same 
year  that  marks  the  last  military  triumph  at  Rome  also  signalizes 
the  last  gladiatorial  combat  in  the  Roman  amphitheatre.     It  is  to 


340  DECLINE  AND   FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

Christianity  that  the  credit  of  the  suppression  of  the  inhuman 
exhibitions  of  the  amphitheatre  is  entirely,  or  almost  entirely,  due. 
The  pagan  philosophers  usually  regarded  them  with  indifference, 
often  with  favor.  Thus  Pliny  commends  a  friend  for  giving  a  glad- 
iatorial entertainment  at  the  funeral  of  his  wife.  And  when  the 
pagan  moralists  did  condemn  the  spectacles,  it  was  rather  for  other 
reasons  than  that  they  regarded  them  as  inhuman  and  absolutely 
contrary  to  the  rules  of  ethics.  They  were  defended  on  the  ground 
that  they  fostered  a  martial  spirit  among  the  people  and  inured 
the  soldier  to  the  sights  of  the  battle-field.  Hence  gladiatorial 
games  were  actually  exhibited  to  the  legions  before  they  set  out 
on  their  campaigns.  Indeed,  all  classes  appear  to  have  viewed 
the  matter  in  much  the  same  light,  and  with  exactly  the  same 
absence  of  moral  disapprobation,  that  we  ourselves  regard  the 
slaughter  of  animals  for  food. 

But  the  Christian  fathers  denounced  the  combats  as  absolutely 
immoral,  and  labored  in  every  possible  way  to  create  a  public 
opinion  against  them.  The  members  of  their  own  body  who 
attended  the  spectacles  were  excommunicated.  At  length,  in 
a.d.  325,  the  first  imperial  edict  against  them  was  issued  by 
Constantine.  This  decree  appears  to  have  been  very  little  re- 
garded ;  nevertheless,  from  this  time  forward  the  exhibitions  were 
under  something  of  a  ban,  until  their  final  abolition  was  brought 
about  by  an  incident  of  the  games  that  closed  the  triumph 
of  Honorius.  In  the  midst  of  the  exhibition  a  Christian  monk, 
named  Telemachus,  descending  into  the  arena,  rushed  between 
the  combatants,  but  was  instantly  killed  by  a  shower  of  missiles 
thrown  by  the  people,  who  were  angered  by  this  interruption  of 
their  sports.  But  the  people  soon  repented  of  their  act;  and 
Honorius  himself,  who  was  present,  was  moved  by  the  scene. 
Christianity  had  awakened  the  conscience  and  touched  the  heart 
of  Rome.  The  martyrdom  of  the  monk  led  to  an  imperial  edict 
"which  abolished  forever  the  human  sacrifices  of  the  amphi- 
theatre." 

Invasion  of  Italy  by  Various  German  Tribes. — While  Italy 


THE  RANSOM  OF  ROME.  341 

was  celebrating  her  triumph  over  the  Goths,  another  and  more 
formidable  invasion  was  preparing  in  the  North.  The  tribes  be- 
yond the  Rhine  —  the  Vandals,  the  Suevi,  the  Burgundians,  and 
other  peoples  —  driven  onward  by  some  unknown  cause,  poured 
in  impetuous  streams  from  the  forests  and  morasses  of  Germany, 
and  bursting  the  barriers  of  the  Alps,  overspread  the  devoted 
plains  of  Italy.  The  alarm  caused  by  them  among  the  Italians 
was  even  greater  than  that  inspired  by  the  Gothic  invasion ;  for 
Alaric  was  a  Christian,  while  Radagaisus,  the  leader  of  the  new 
hordes,  was  a  superstitious  savage,  who  paid  worship  to  gods  that 
required  the  bloody  sacrifice  of  captive  enemies. 

By  such  efforts  as  Rome  put  forth  in  the  younger  and  more 
vigorous  days  of  the  republic,  when  Hannibal  was  at  her  gates,  an 
army  was  now  equipped  and  placed  under  the  command  of  Stilicho. 
Meanwhile  the  barbarians  had  advanced  as  far  as  Florence,  and 
were  now  besieging  that  place.  Stilicho  here  surrounded  the  vast 
host  —  variously  estimated  from  200,000  to  400,000  men  —  and 
starved  them  into  a  surrender.  Their  chief,  Radagaisus,  was  put 
to  death,  and  great  multitudes  of  the  barbarians  that  the  sword 
and  famine  had  spared  were  sold  as  slaves  (a.d.  406). 

The  Ransom  of  Rome  (a.d.  409).  —  Shortly  after  the  victory 
of  Stilicho  over  the  German  barbarians,  he  came  under  the  suspi- 
cion of  the  weak  and  jealous  Honorius,  and  was  executed.  Thus  fell 
the  great  general  whose  sword  and  counsel  had  twice  saved  Rome 
from  the  barbarians,  and  who  might  again  have  averted  similar 
dangers  that  were  now  at  hand.  Listening  to  the  rash  counsels  of 
his  unworthy  advisers,  Honorius  provoked  to  revolt  the  30,000 
Gothic  mercenaries  in  the  Roman  legions  by  a  massacre  of  their 
wives  and  children,  who  were  held  as  hostages  in  the  different 
cities  of  Italy.  The  Goths  beyond  the  Alps  joined  with  their 
kinsmen  to  avenge  the  perfidious  act.  Alaric  again  crossed  the 
mountains,  and  pillaging  the  cities  in  his  way,  led  his  hosts  to  the 
very  gates  of  Rome.  Not  since  the  time  of  the  dread  Hannibal 
(see  p.  263)  — more  than  six  hundred  years  before  —  had  Rome 
been  insulted  by  the  presence  of  a  foreign  foe  beneath  her  walls. 


342  DECLINE   AND  FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

The  barbarians  laying  siege  to  the  city,  famine  soon  forced  the 
Romans  to  sue  for  terms  of  surrender.  The  ambassadors  of  the 
Senate,  when  they  came  before  Alaric,  began,  in  lofty  language, 
to  warn  him  not  to  render  the  Romans  desperate  by  hard  or 
dishonorable  terms  :  their  fury  when  driven  to  despair,  they  repre- 
sented, was  terrible,  and  their  number  enormous.  "  The  thicker 
the  grass,  the  easier  to  mow  it,"  was  Alaric's  derisive  reply.  The 
barbarian  chieftain  at  length  named  the  ransom  that  he  would 
accept,  and  spare  the  city.  Small  as  it  comparatively  was,  the 
Romans  were  able  to  raise  it  only  by  the  most  extraordinary 
measures.  The  images  of  the  gods  were  stripped  of  their  orna- 
ments of  gold  and  precious  stones,  and  even  the  statues  themselves 
were  melted  down. 

Sack  of  Rome  by  Alaric  (a.d.  410).  —  Upon  retiring  from 
Rome,  Alaric  established  his  camp  in  Etruria.  Here  he  was  joined 
by  great  numbers  of  fugitive  slaves,  and  by  fresh  accessions  of  bar- 
barians from  beyond  the  Alps.  The  Gallic  king  now  demanded 
for  his  followers  lands  of  Honorius,  but  the  emperor  treated  all  the 
proposals  of  the  barbarian  with  foolish  insolence.  Rome  paid  the 
penalty.  Alaric  turned  upon  the  devoted  city,  determined  upon 
its  sack  and  plunder.  The  barbarians  broke  into  the  capital 
by  night,  "and  the  inhabitants  were  awakened  by  the  tremen- 
dous sound  of  the  Gothic  trumpet."  Precisely  eight  hundred  years 
had  passed  since  its  sack  by  the  Gauls.  During  that  time  the 
Imperial  City  had  carried  its  victorious  standards  over  three  con- 
tinents, and  had  gathered  within  the  temples  of  its  gods  and  the 
palaces  of  its  nobles  the  plunder  of  the  world.  Now  it  was  given 
over  for  a  spoil  to  the  fierce  tribes  from  beyond  the  Danube. 

Alaric  commanded  his  soldiers  to  respect  the  lives  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  to  leave  untouched  the  treasures  of  the  Christian  temples ; 
but  the  wealth  of  the  citizens  he  encouraged  them  to  make  their 
own.  For  six  days  and  nights  the  rough  barbarians  trooped 
through  the  streets  of  the  city  on  their  mission  of  pillage.  Their 
wagons  were  heaped  with  the  costly  furniture,  the  rich  plate,  and 
the   silken   garments  stripped  from  the  palaces  of  the  wealthy 


EFFECTS   OF   THE  DISASTER.  343 

patricians  and  the  temples  of  the  gods.  Amidst  the  license  of  the 
sack,  the  barbarian  instincts  of  the  robbers  broke  loose  from  all 
restraint,  and  the  city  was  everywhere  wet  with  blood,  while  the 
nights  were  lighted  with  burning  buildings. 

Effects  of  the  Disaster  upon  Paganism. — The  overwhelming 
disaster  that  had  befallen  the  Imperial  City  produced  a  profound 
impression  upon  both  Pagans  and  Christians  throughout  the  Roman 
world.  The  former  asserted  that  these  unutterable  calamities  had 
fallen  upon  the  Roman  state  because  of  the  abandonment  by  the 
people  of  the  worship  of  the  gods  of  their  forefathers,  under  whose 
protection  and  favor  Rome  had  become  the  mistress  of  the  world. 
The  Christians,  on  the  other  hand,  saw  in  the  fall  of  the  Eternal 
City  the  fulfilment  of  the  prophecies  against  the  Babylon  of  the 
Apocalypse.  The  latter  interpretation  of  the  appalling  calamity 
gained  credit  amidst  the  panic  and  despair  of  the  times.  The 
temples  of  the  once  popular  deities  were  deserted  by  their  wor- 
shippers, who  had  lost  faith  in  gods  that  could  neither  save  them- 
selves nor  protect  their  shrines  from  spoliation.  "  Henceforth," 
says  Merivale,  "  the  power  of  paganism  was  entirely  broken,  and 
the  indications  which  occasionally  meet  us  of  its  continued  exist- 
ence are  rare  and  trifling.  Christianity  stepped  into  its  deserted 
inheritance.  The  Christians  occupied  the  temples,  transforming 
them  into  churches." 

The  Death  of  Alaric. — After  withdrawing  his  warriors  from 
Rome,  Alaric  led  them  southward.  As  they  moved  slowly  on, 
they  piled  still  higher  the  wagons  of  their  long  trains  with  the  rich 
spoils  of  the  cities  and  villas  of  Campania  and  other  districts  of 
Southern  Italy.  In  the  villas  of  the  Roman  nobles  the  rough  bar- 
barians spread  rare  banquets  from  the  stores  of  their  well-filled 
cellars,  and  drank  from  jewelled  cups  the  famed  Falernian  wine. 

Alaric  led  his  soldiers  to  the  extreme  southern  point  of  Italy, 
intending  to  cross  the  Straits  of  Messina  into  Sicily,  and,  after  sub- 
duing that  island,  to  carry  his  conquests  into  the  provinces  of 
Africa.  His  designs  were  frustrated  by  his  death,  which  occurred 
a.d.  412.     With  religious  care  his  followers  secured  the  body  of 


344  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF  THE  EMPIRE. 

their  hero  against  violation  by  his  enemies.  The  little  river  Busen- 
tinus,  in  Northern  Bruttium,  was  turned  from  its  course  with  great 
labor,  and  in  the  bed  of  the  stream  was  constructed  a  tomb,  in 
which  was  placed  the  body  of  the  king,  with  his  jewels  and  tro- 
phies. The  river  was  then  restored  to  its  old  channel,  and,  that 
the  exact  spot  might  never  be  known,  the  prisoners  who  had  been 
forced  to  do  the  work  were  all  put  to  death. 

The  Barbarians  Seize  the  Western  Provinces.  —  We  must  now 
turn  our  eyes  from  Rome  and  Italy  to  observe  the  movement  of 
events  in  the  provinces.  In  his  efforts  to  defend  Italy,  Stilicho 
had  withdrawn  the  last  legion  from  Britain,  and  had  drained  the 
camps  and  fortresses  of  Gaul.  The  Wall  of  Antoninus  was  left 
unmanned ;  the  passages  of  the  Rhine  were  left  unguarded ;  and 
the  agitated  multitudes  of  barbarians  beyond  these  defences  were 
free  to  pour  their  innumerable  hosts  into  all  the  fair  provinces  of 
the  empire.  Hordes  of  Suevi,  Alani,  Vandals,  and  Burgundians 
overspread  all  the  plains  and  valleys  of  Gaul.  The  Vandals 
pushed  on  into  the  south  of  Spain,  and  there  occupied  a  large 
tract  of  country,  which,  in  its  present  name  of  Andalusia,  preserves 
the  memory  of  its  barbarian  settlers.  From  these  regions  they 
crossed  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  overran  the  Roman  provinces  of 
Northern  Africa,  captured  Carthage  (a.d.  439),  and  made  that 
city  the  seat  of  the  dread  empire  of  the  Vandals.  The  Goths, 
with  Italy  pillaged,  recrossed  the  Alps,  and  establishing  their 
camps  in  the  south  of  Gaul  and  the  north  of  Spain,  set  up  in 
those  regions  what  is  known  as  the  Kingdom  of  the  Visigoths. 

In  Britain,  upon  the  withdrawal  of  the  Roman  legions,  the  Picts 
breaking  over  the  Wall  of  Antoninus,  descended  upon  and  pillaged 
the  cities  of  the  South.  The  half- Romanized  and  effeminate  pro- 
vincials —  no  match  for  their  hardy  kinsmen  who  had  never  bowed 
their  necks  to  the  yoke  of  Rome  —  were  driven  to  despair  by  the 
ravages  of  their  relentless  enemies,  and,  in  their  helplessness,  in- 
vited to  their  aid  the  Angles  and  Saxons  from  the  shores  of  the 
North  Sea.  These  people  came  in  their  rude  boats,  drove  back 
the  invaders,  and,  being  pleased  with  the  soil  and  climate  of  the 


INVASION  OF  THE  HUNS.  345 

island,  took  possession  of  the  country  for  themselves,  and  became 
the  ancestors  of  the  English  people. 

Invasion  of  the  Huns:  Battle  of  Chalons.  —  The  barbarians 
that  were  thus  overrunning  and  parcelling  out  the  inheritance  of 
the  dying  empire  were  now,  in  turn,  pressed  upon  and  terrified  by 
a  foe  more  hideous  and  dreadful  in  their  eyes  than  were  they  in 
the  sight  of  the  peoples  among  whom  they  had  thrust  themselves. 
These  were  the  non- Aryan  Huns,  of  whom  we  have  already  caught 
a  glimpse  as  they  drove  the  panic-stricken  Goths  across  the  Dan- 
ube. At  this  time  their  leader  was  Attila,  whom  the  affrighted  in- 
habitants of  Europe  called  the  "  Scourge  of  God."  It  was  declared 
that  the  grass  never  grew  again  where  once  the  hoof  of  Attila's 
horse  had  trod. 

Attila  defeated  the  armies  of  the  Eastern  emperor,  and  exacted 
tribute  from  the  court  of  Constantinople.  Finally  he  turned  west- 
ward, and,  at  the  head  of  a  host  numbering,  it  is  asserted,  700,000 
warriors,  crossed  the  Rhine  into  Gaul,  purposing  first  to  ravage 
that  province,  and  then  to  traverse  Italy  with  fire  and  sword,  in 
order  to  destroy  the  last  vestige  of  the  Roman  power. 

The  Romans  and  their  Gothic  conquerors  laid  aside  their  ani- 
mosities, and  made  common  cause  against  the  common  enemy. 
The  Visigoths  were  rallied  by  their  king,  Theodoric ;  the  Italians, 
the  Franks,  the  Burgundians,  flocked  to  the  standard  of  the  Roman 
general  Aetius.  Attila  drew  up  his  mighty  hosts  upon  the  plain 
of  Chalons,  in  the  north  of  Gaul,  and  there  awaited  the  onset  of 
the  Romans  and  their  allies.  The  conflict  was  long  and  terrible. 
Theodoric  was  slain ;  but  at  last  fortune  turned  against  the  barba- 
rians. The  loss  of  the  Huns  is  variously  estimated  at  from  100,000 
to  300,000  warriors.  Attila  succeeded  in  escaping  from  the  field, 
and  retreated  with  his  shattered  hosts  across  the  Rhine  (a.d. 
450- 

This  great  victory  is  placed  among  the  significant  events  of  his- 
tory ;  for  it  decided  that  the  Christian  Germanic  races,  and  not 
the  pagan  Scythic  Huns,  should  inherit  the  dominions  of  the  ex- 
piring Roman  Empire,  and  control  the  destinies  of  Europe. 


346  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF   THE   EMPIRE. 

The  Death  of  Attila.  —  The  year  after  his  defeat  at  Chalons, 
Attila  again  crossed  the  Alps,  and  burned  or  plundered  all  the 
important  cities  of  Northern  Italy.  The  Veneti  fled  for  safety  to 
the  morasses  at  the  head  of  the  Adriatic  (a.d.  452).  Upon  the 
islets  where  they  built  their  rude  dwellings,  there  grew  up  in  time 
the  city  of  Venice,  the  "  eldest  daughter  of  the  Roman  Empire," 
the  "  Carthage  of  the  Middle  Ages." 

The  conqueror  threatened  Rome ;  but  Leo  the  Great,  bishop 
of  the  capital,  went  with  an  embassy  to  the  camp  of  Attila,  and 
pleaded  for  the  city.  He  recalled  to  the  mind  of  Attila  the  fact 
that  death  had  overtaken  the  impious  Alaric  soon  after  he  had 
given  the  Imperial  City  to  be  sacked,  and  warned  him  not  to  call 
down  upon  himself  the  like  judgment  of  heaven.  To  these  ad- 
monitions of  the  Christian  bishop  was  added  the  persuasion  of  a 
golden  bribe  from  the  Emperor  Valentinian ;  and  Attila  was  in- 
duced to  spare  Southern  Italy,  and  to  lead  his  warriors  back  beyond 
the  Alps.  Shortly  after  he  had  crossed  the  Danube,  he  died  sud- 
denly in  his  camp.  His  followers  gradually  withdrew  from  Europe 
into  the  wilds  of  their  native  Scythia,  or  were  absorbed  by  the 
peoples  they  had  conquered. 

Sack  of  Rome  by  the  Vandals  (a.d.  455).  —  Rome  had  been 
saved  a  visitation  from  the  spoiler  of  the  North,  but  a  new  de- 
struction was  about  to  burst  upon  it  by  way  of  the  sea  from  the 
South.  Africa  sent  out  another  enemy  whose  greed  for  plunder 
proved  more  fatal  to  Rome  than  the  eternal  hate  of  Hannibal. 
The  kings  of  the  Vandal  Empire  in  Northern  Africa  had  acquired 
as  perfect  a  supremacy  in  the  Western  Mediterranean  as  Carthage 
ever  enjoyed  in  the  days  of  her  commercial  pride.  Vandal  cor- 
sairs swept  the  seas  and  harassed  the  coasts  of  Sicily  and  Italy, 
and  even  plundered  the  maritime  towns  of  the  Eastern  provinces. 
In  the  year  455  a  Vandal  fleet,  led  by  the  dread  Genseric,  sailed 
up  the  Tiber. 

Panic  seized  the  people ;  for  the  name  of  Vandal  was  pro- 
nounced with  terror  throughout  the  world.  Again  the  great  Leo, 
who  had  once  before  saved  his  flock  from  the  fury  of  an  Attila, 


FALL   OF  THE  EMPLRE  IN  THE    WEST.  347 

went  forth  to  intercede  in  the  name  of  Christ  for  the  Imperial 
City.  Genseric  granted  to  the  pious  bishop  the  lives  of  the  citi- 
zens, but  said  that  the  plunder  of  the  capital  belonged  to  his  war- 
riors. For  fourteen  days  and  nights  the  city  was  given  over  to  the 
ruthless  barbarians.  The  ships  of  the  Vandals,  which  almost  hid 
with  their  number  the  waters  of  the  Tiber,  were  piled,  as  had  been , 
the  wagons  of  the  Goths  before  them,  with  the  rich  and  weighty 
spoils  of  the  capital.  Palaces  were  stripped  of  their  ornaments 
and  furniture,  and  the  walls  of  the  temples  denuded  of  their 
statues  and  of  the  trophies  of  a  hundred  Roman  victories.  From 
the  Capitoline  sanctuary  were  borne  off  the  golden  candlestick 
and  other  sacred  articles  that  Titus  had  stolen  from  the  Temple 
at  Jerusalem. 

The  greed  of  the  barbarians  was  sated  at  last,  and  they  were 
ready  to  withdraw.  The  Vandal  fleet  sailed  for  Carthage,1  bear- 
ing, besides  the  plunder  of  the  city,  more  than  30,000  of  the 
inhabitants  as  slaves.  Carthage,  through  her  own  barbarian  con- 
querors, was  at  last  avenged  upon  her  hated  rival.  The  mournful 
presentiment  of  Scipio  had  fallen  true  (see  p.  271).  The  cruel 
fate  of  Carthage  might  have  been  read  again  in  the  pillaged  city 
that  the  Vandals  left  behind  them. 

Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  West  (a.d.  476).  —  Only  the 
shadow  of  the  Empire  in  the  West  now  remained.  All  the  prov- 
inces—  Illyricum,  Gaul,  Britain,  Spain,  and  Africa  —  were  in  the 
hands  of  the  Goths,  the  Vandals,  the  Franks,  the  Burgundians,  the 
Angles  and  Saxons,  and  various  other  intruding  tribes.  Italy,  as 
well  as  Rome  herself,  had  become  again  and  again  the  spoil  of  the 
insatiable  barbarians.  The  story  of  the  twenty  years  following  the 
sack  of  the  capital  by  Genseric  affords  only  a  repetition  of  the 
events  we  have  been  narrating.     During  these  years  several  pup- 

1  The  fleet  was  overtaken  by  a  storm  and  suffered  some  damage,  but  the 
most  precious  of  the  relics  it  bore  escaped  harm.  "The  golden  candlestick 
reached  the  African  capital,  was  recovered  a  century  later,  and  lodged  in  Con- 
stantinople by  Justinian,  and  by  him  replaced,  from  superstitious  motives,  in 
Jerusalem.     From  that  time  its  history  is  lost."  —  Merivale. 


348  DECLINE  AND  FALL    OF   THE  EMPIRE. 

pet  emperors  were  set  up  by  the  different  leaders  of  the  invading 
tribes.  A  final  seditious  movement  placed  upon  the  shadow- 
throne  a  child  of  six  years,  named  Romulus  Augustus.  Chiefly 
because  of  the  imperial  farce  he  was  forced  to  play,  this  child- 
emperor  became  known  as  Augustulus,  "  the  little  Augustus."  He 
had  reigned  only  a  year,  when  Odoacer,  the  leader  of  a  tribe  of 
German  mercenaries,  dethroned  him,  and  abolishing  the  title  of 
emperor,  took,  upon  himself  the  government  of  Italy. 

The  Roman  Senate  now  sent  an  embassy  to  Constantinople, 
with  the  royal  vestments  and  the  insignia  of  the  imperial  office,  to 
represent  to  the  Emperor  Zeno  that  the  West  was  willing  to  give 
up  its  claims  to  an  emperor  of  its  own,  and  to  request  that  the 
German  chief,  with  the  title  of  "  Patrician,"  might  rule  Italy  as 
his  viceroy.  This  was  granted ;  and  Italy  now  became  in  effect 
a  province  of  the  Empire  in  the  East  (a.d.  476).  The  Roman 
Empire  in  the  West  had  come  to  an  end,  after  an  existence  from 
the  founding  of  Rome  of  1229  years. 


FINAL  PARTITION  OF  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE. 


349 


ROMAN    EMPERORS    FROM    COMMODUS    TO    ROMULUS 
AUGUSTUS. 
(a.d.  180-476.) 


Commodus 

Pertinax 

Didius  Julianus   .... 
Septimius  Severus  .     .     .     , 

(  Caracalla 

1  Geta 

Macrinus 

Elagabalus 

Alexander  Severus  ... 

Maximin 

Gordian  III 

Philip 

Decius 

Period  of  the  Thirty  Tyrants 

Claudius 

Aurelian 

Tacitus 

Probus  

Carus 

f  Carinus 

iNumerian 


A.D. 

180-192 
193 
193 
193-21 1 
211-217 
211-212 
217-218 
218-222 
222-235 
235-238 
238-244 
244-249 
249-251 
251-268 
268-270 
270-275 
275-276 
276-282 
282-283 
283-284 
283-284 


/  Diocletian 284-305 

I  Maximian 286-305 

f  Constantius  1 305-306 

iGalerius 305-311 

Constantine  the  Great       .     .  306-337 
Reigns  as  sole  ruler      .     .  323-337 

Constantine  II 337~34Q 

Constans  1 337"35° 

Constantius  II 337~36i 

Reigns  as  sole  ruler      .     .  350-361 
Julian  the  Apostate      .     .     .  361-363 

Jovian 363-364 

(  Valentinian  1 364-375 

(  Valens  (in  the  East)     .     .  364-378 

Gratian 375-3^3 

Maximus 383-388 

Valentinian  II 375~392 

Eugenius 392~394 

Theodosius  the  Great  .     .     .  379-395 
Reigns  as  sole  emperor      .  394-395 


FINAL   PARTITION  OF  THE   ROMAN   EMPIRE. 

(A.D.  395.) 


EMPERORS  IN   THE   EAST. 
(From  a.d.  395  to  Fall  of  Rome.) 

A.D. 

Arcadius 395-408 

Theodosius  II 408-450 

Marcian 450-457 

Leo  I 457-474 

Zeno 474-491 


EMPERORS  IN   THE  WEST. 

A.D. 

Honorius 395~423 

Valentinian  HI 425-455 

Maximus    .......  455 

Avitus 455-456 

Count    Ricimer   creates    and 

deposes  emperors     .     .     .  456-472 
Romulus  Augustus  ....  475-476 


350  ARCHITECTURE. 


CHAPTER    XXXI. 

ARCHITECTURE,   LITERATURE,   LAW,   AND   SOCIAL   LIFE 
AMONG  THE   ROMANS. 

i .   Architecture. 

Greek  Origin  of  Roman  Architecture :  the  Arch.  —  The  archi- 
tecture of  the  Romans  was,  in  the  main,  an  imitation  of  Greek 
models.  But  the  Romans  were  not  mere  servile  imitators.  They 
not  only  modified  the  architectural  forms  they  borrowed,  but  they 
gave  their  structures  a  distinct  character  by  the  prominent  use  of 
the  arch,  which  the  Greek  and  Oriental  builders  seldom  employed, 
though  they  were  acquainted  with  its  properties.  By  means  of  it 
the  Roman  builders  vaulted  the  roofs  of  the  largest  buildings, 
carried  stupendous  aqueducts  across  the  deepest  valleys,  and 
spanned  the  broadest  streams  with  bridges  that  have  resisted  all 
the  assaults  of  time  and  flood  to  the  present  day. 

Sacred  Edifices.  —  The  temples  of  the  Romans  were  in  general 
so  like  those  of  the  Greeks  that  we  need  not  here  take  time  and 
space  to  enter  into  a  particular  description  of  them.  Mention, 
however,  should  be  made  of  their  circular  vaulted  temples,  as  this 
was  a  style  of  building  almost  exclusively  Italian.  The  best  repre- 
sentative of  this  style  of  sacred  edifices  is  the  Pantheon  at  Rome, 
which  has  come  down  to  our  own  times  in  a  state  of  wonderful 
preservation.  This  structure  is  about  140  feet  in  diameter.  The 
immense  stone  dome  which  vaults  the  building,  is  one  of  the 
boldest  pieces  of  masonry  executed  by  the  master-builders  of 
the  world. 

Circuses,  Theatres,  and  Amphitheatres. — The  circuses  of  the 
Romans  were  what  we  should  call  race- courses.  There  were 
several  at  Rome,  the  most  celebrated  being  the  Circus  Maximus, 


352  ARCHITECTURE. 

which  was  first  laid  out  in  the  time  of  the  Tarquins,  and  afterwards 
enlarged  as  the  population  of  the  capital  increased,  until  it  was 
capable  of  holding  two  or  three  hundred  thousand  spectators. 

The  Romans  borrowed  the  plan  of  their  theatres  from  the 
Greeks ;  their  amphitheatres,  however,  were  original  with  them. 
The  Flavian  Amphitheatre,  known  as  the  Colosseum,  has  already 
come  under  our  notice  (see  p.  316).  The  edifice  was  574  feet 
in  its  greatest  diameter,  and  was  capable  of  seating  eighty-seven 
thousand  spectators.  The  ruins  of  this  immense  structure  stand 
to-day  as  "  the  embodiment  of  the  power  and  splendor  of  the 
Roman  Empire." 

Aqueducts.  — The  aqueducts  of  ancient  Rome  were  among  the 
most  important  of  the  utilitarian  works  of  the  Romans.  The 
water-system  of  the  capital  was  commenced  by  Appius  Claudius 
(about  313  B.C.),  who  secured  the  building  of  an  aqueduct  which 
led  water  into  the  city  from  the  Sabine  hills.  During  the  republic 
four  aqueducts  in  all  were  completed ;  under  the  emperors  the 
number  was  increased  to  nineteen.1  The  longest  of  these  was 
about  fifty-five  miles  in  length.  The  aqueducts  usually  ran  be- 
neath the  surface,  but  when  a  depression  was  to  be  crossed,  they 
were  lifted  on  arches,  which  sometimes  were  over  one  hundred 
feet  high.  These  lofty  arches  running  in  long  broken  lines  over 
the  plains  beyond  the  walls  of  Rome,  are  the  most  striking  feature 
of  the  Campagna  at  the  present  time. 

Thermae,  or  Baths.  —  The  greatest  demand  upon  the  streams 
of  water  poured  into  Rome  by  the  aqueducts  was  made  by  the 
Thermae,  or  baths.  Among  the  ancients  Romans,  bathing,  re- 
garded at  first  simply  as  a  troublesome  necessity,  became  in  time  a 
luxurious  art.  Under  the  republic,  bathing-houses  were  erected  in 
considerable  numbers.  But  it  was  during  the  imperial  period  that 
those  magnificent  structures  to  which  the  name  of  Thermae  prop- 
erly attaches,  were  erected.  These  edifices  were  among  the  most 
elaborate  and  expensive  of  the  imperial  works.  They  contained 
chambers  for   cold,  hot,  tepid,  sudatory,  and   swimming   baths; 

1  Several  of  these  are  still  in  use. 


MEMORIAL  ARCHITECTURE. 


353 


dressing-rooms  and  gymnasia ;  museums  and  libraries ;  covered 
colonnades  for  lounging  and  conversation,  extensive  grounds  filled 
with  statues  and  traversed  by  pleasant  walks ;  and  every  other 
adjunct  that  could  add  to  the  sense  of  luxury  and  relaxation.  Be- 
ing intended  to  exhibit  the  liberality  of  their  builders,  they  were 
thrown  open  to  the  public  free  of  charge. 

Memorial  Architecture.  —  Among  the  memorial  structures  of 
the  Romans,  their  triumphal  arches  are  especially  characteristic. 


ARCH    OF   CONSTANTINE. 

These  were  modelled  after  the  city  gates,  being  constructed  with 
single  and  with  triple  archways.  Two  of  the  most  noted  monu- 
ments of  this  character,  and  the  most  interesting  because  of  their 
historic  connections,  are  the  Arch  of  Titus  (see  p.  315)  and  the 
Arch  of  Constantine,  both  of  which  are  still  standing.  The  Arch 
of  Constantine  was  intended  to  commemorate  the  victory  of  that 
emperor  over  his  rival  Maxentius,  which  event  established  Chris- 
tianity as  the  imperial  and  favored  religion  of  the  empire. 


354  LITERATURE,  PHILOSOPHY,   AND  LAW. 

2.   Literature,  Philosophy,  and  Law. 

Relation  of  Roman  to  Greek  Literature :  the  Poets  of  the 
Republican  Era.  —  Latin  literature  was  almost  wholly  imitative 
or  borrowed,  being  a  reproduction  of  Greek  models  ;  still  it  per- 
formed a  most  important  service  for  civilization  :  it  was  the  medium 
for  the  dissemination  throughout  the  world  of  the  rich  literary 
treasures  of  Greece. 

It  was  the  dramatic  productions  of  the  Greeks  which  were  first 
studied  and  copied  at  Rome.  Livius  Andronicus,  Naevius,  En- 
nius,  Plautus,  and  Terence,  all  of  whom  wrote  under  the  repub- 
lic, are  the  most  noted  of  the  Roman  dramatists.  Most  of  their 
plays  were  simply  adaptations  or  translations  of  Greek  master- 
pieces. 

Lucilius  (born  148  B.C.)  was  one  of  the  greatest  of  Roman 
satirists.  The  later  satirists  of  the  corrupt  imperial  era  were  his 
imitators.  Besides  Lucilius,  there  appeared  during  the  later  re- 
publican era  only  two  other  poets  of  distinguished  merit,  Lucre- 
tius and  Catullus.  Lucretius  (95-51  B.C.)  was  an  evolutionist, 
and  in  his  great  poem,  On  the  Nature  of  Things,  we  find  antici- 
pated many  of  the  conclusions  of  modern  scientists. 

Poets  of  the  Augustan  Age.  —  We  have  in  another  place  (see 
p.  307)  spoken  of  the  effects  of  the  fall  of  the  republic  upon  the 
development  of  Latin  literature.  Many,  who  if  the  republican 
institutions  had  continued  would  have  been  absorbed  in  the  affairs 
of  state,  were  led,  by  the  change  of  government,  to  seek  solace 
for  their  disappointed  hopes,  and  employment  for  their  enforced 
leisure,  in  the  graceful  labors  of  elegant  composition.  Four  names 
have  cast  an  unfading  lustre  over  the  period  covered  by  the  reign 
of  Augustus,  —  Virgil,  Horace,  Ovid,  and  Livy.  So  distinguished 
have  these  writers  rendered  the  age  in  which  they  lived,  that  any 
period  in  a  people's  literature  marked  by  unusual  literary  taste 
and  refinement  is  called,  in  allusion  to  the  Roman  era,  an  Augus- 
tan Age.     Of  the  three  poets,  Virgil,  Horace,  and  Ovid,  a  word 


SATIRE  AND   SATIRISTS.  355 

has  already  been  said ;  of  Livy  we  shall  find  place  to  say  some- 
thing a  little  later,  under  the  head  of  the  Roman  historians. 

Satire  and  Satirists. — Satire  thrives  best  in  the  reeking  soil 
and  tainted  atmosphere  of  an  age  of  selfishness,  immorality,  and 
vice.  Such  an  age  was  that  which  followed  the  Augustan  era 
at  Rome.  The  throne  was  held  by  such  imperial  monsters  as 
Caligula,  Nero,  and  Domitian.  The  profligacy  of  fashionable  life 
at  the  capital  and  the  various  watering-places  of  the  empire,  and 
the  degradation  of  the  court  gave  venom  and  point  to  the  shafts 
of  those  who  were  goaded  by  the  spectacle  into  attacking  the 
immoralities  and  vices  which  were  silently  yet  rapidly  sapping  the 
foundations  of  both  society  and  state.  Hence  arose  a  succession 
of  writers  whose  mastery  of  sharp  and  stinging  satire  has  caused 
their  productions  to  become  the  models  of  all  subsequent  attempts 
in  the  same  species  of  literature.  Two  names  stand  out  in  special 
prominence  —  Persius  and  Juvenal,  who  lived  and  wrote  during 
the  last  half  of  the  first  and  the  beginning  of  the  second  century 
of  our  era. 

Oratory  among  the  Romans.  —  "  Public  oratory,"  as  has  been 
truly  said,  "is  the  child  of  political  freedom,  and  cannot  exist 
without  it."  We  have  seen  this  illustrated  in  the  history  of  repub- 
lican Athens.  Equally  well  is  the  same  truth  exemplified  by  the 
records  of  the  Roman  state.  All  the  great  orators  of  Rome  arose 
under  the  republic. 

Roman  oratory  was  senatorial,  popular,  or  judicial.  These 
different  styles  of  eloquence  were  represented  by  the  grave  and 
dignified  debates  of  the  Senate,  the  impassioned  and  often  noisy 
and  inelegant  harangues  of  the  Forum,  and  the  learned  pleadings 
or  ingenious  appeals  of  the  courts.  Among  the  orators  of  ancient 
Rome,  Hortensius,  (114-50  B.C.),  an  eloquent,  advocate,  and 
Cicero  (106-43  B-c-)  are  easily  first. 

Historians.  —  Ancient  Rome  produced  four  writers  of  history 
whose  works  have  won  for  them  a  permanent  fame  —  Caesar,  Sal- 
lust,  Livy,  and  Tacitus.  Of  Caesar  and  his  Commentaries  on  the 
Gallic  War,  we  have  learned  in  a  previous  chapter.     His  Com- 


356  LITERATURE,   PHILOSOPHY,   AND  LAW. 

mentaries  will  always  be  mentioned  with  the  Anabasis  of  Xeno- 
phon,  as  a  model  of  the  narrative  style  of  writing.  Sallust  (86-34 
B.C.)  was  the  contemporary  and  friend  of  Caesar.  The  two  works 
upon  which  his  fame  rests  are  the  Conspiracy  of  Catiline  and  the 
Jugurthine  War. 

Livy  (59  B.C.  —  a.d.  17)  was  one  of  the  brightest  ornaments  of 
the  Augustan  age.  Herodotus  among  the  ancient,  and  Macaulay 
among  the  modern,  writers  of  historical  narrative,  are  the  names 
with  which  his  is  most  frequently  compared.  His  greatest  work 
is  his  Annals,  a  history  of  Rome  from  the  earliest  times  to  the 
year  9  B.C.  Unfortunately,  all  save  thirty-five  of  the  books *  —  the 
work  filled  one  hundred  and  forty-two  volumes  —  perished  during 
the  disturbed  period  that  followed  the  overthrow  of  the  empire. 
Many  have  been  the  laments  over  "  the  lost  books  of  Livy."  As 
a  chronicle  of  actual  events,  Livy's  history,  particularly  in  its 
earlier  parts,  is  very  unreliable ;  however,  it  is  invaluable  as  an  ac- 
count of  what  the  Romans  themselves  believed  respecting  the 
origin  of  their  race,  the  founding  of  their  city,  and  the  deeds 
and  virtues  of  their  forefathers. 

The  most  highly  prized  work  of  Tacitus  is  his  Germania,  a 
treatise  on  the  manners  and  customs  of  the  Germans.  Tacitus 
dwells  with  delight  upon  the  simple  life  of  the  uncivilized  Ger- 
mans, and  sets  their  virtues  in  strong  contrast  with  the  immorali- 
ties of  the  refined  and  cultured  Romans. 

Ethics,  Science,  and  Philosophy.  —  Under  this  head  may  be 
grouped  the  names  of  Seneca,  Pliny  the  Elder,  Marcus  Aurelius, 
and  Epictetus.  Seneca  (about  a.d.  1-65),  moralist  and  philoso- 
pher, has  already  come  to  our  notice  as  the  tutor  of  Nero  (see 
p.  312).  He  was  a  disbeliever  in  the  popular  religion  of  his 
countrymen,  and*  entertained  conceptions  of  God  and  his  moral 

1  It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  a  book  in  the  ancient  sense  was  simply 
a  roll  of  manuscript  or  parchment,  and  contained  nothing  like  the  amount 
of  matter  held  by  an  ordinary  modern  volume.  Thus  Caesar's  Gallic  Wars, 
which  makes  a  single  volume  of  moderate  size  with  us,  made  eight  Roman 
books. 


ETHICS,    SCIENCE,  AND  PHILOSOPHY. 


357 


government  not  very  different  from  the  doctrines  of  Socrates. 
Pliny  the  Elder  (a.d.  23-79)  is  almost  the  only  Roman  who  won 
renown  as  a  nat- 
uralist. The  only 
work  of  his  that 
has  been  spared 
to  us  is  his  Natu- 
ral History,  a  sort 
ot  "  Roman  Ency- 
clopaedia," embra- 
cing thirty-seven 
books. 

Marcus  Aurelius 
the   emperor  and 
Epictetus  the  slave 
hold  prominent    1 
places  among  the  I 
ethical  teachers  of 
Rome.      Of  the 
emperor  as  a  phi- 
losopher we  have  | 
already    spoken 
(see  p.  321). 

Epictetus  (b.  about  60  a.d.)  was  for  many  years  a  slave  at  the 
capital;  but,  securing  in  some  way  his  freedom,  he  became  a 
teacher  of  philosophy.  Epictetus  and  Aurelius  were  the  last  emi- 
nent representatives  and  expositors  of  the  philosophy  of  Zeno. 
Christianity,  giving  a  larger  place  to  the  affections  than  did 
Stoicism,  was  already  fast  winning  the  hearts  of  men. 

Writers  of  the  Early  Latin  Church.  —  The  Christian  authors 
of  the  first  three  centuries,  like  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament, 
employed  the  Greek,  that  being  the  language  of  learning  and  cul- 
ture. As  the  Latin  tongue,  however,  came  into  more  general  use 
throughout  the  extended  provinces  of  the  Roman  empire,  the 
Christian  authors  naturally  began  to  use  the  same  in  the  composi- 


358  LITERATURE,  PHILOSOPHY,   AND  LAW. 

tion  of  their  works.  Hence,  almost  all  the  writings  of  the  Fathers 
of  the  Church,  produced  during  the  last  two  centuries  of  the 
empire,  were  composed  in  Latin.  Among  the  many  names  that 
adorn  the  Church  literature  of  this  period  may  be  mentioned  Saint 
Jerome  and  Saint  Augustine,  —  the  former  celebrated  for  his  trans- 
lation of  the  Scriptures  into  Latin,1  and  the  latter  for  his  "  City  of 
God."  This  was  truly  a  wonderful  work.  It  was  written  just 
when  Rome  was  becoming  the  spoil  of  the  barbarians,  and  was 
designed  to  answer  the  charge  of  the  pagans  that  Christianity, 
turning  the  hearts  of  the  people  away  from  the  worship  of  the 
ancient  gods,  was  the  cause  of  the  calamities  that  were  befalling 
the  Roman  state. 

Roman  Law  and  Law  Literature.  —  Although  the  Latin  writers 
in  all  the  departments  of  literary  effort  which  we  have  so  far 
reviewed  did  much  valuable  work,  yet  the  Roman  intellect  in  all 
these  directions  was  under  Greek  guidance.  Its  work  was  largely 
imitative.  But  in  another  department  it  was  different.  We  mean, 
of  course,  the  field  of  legal  and  political  science.  Here  the  Ro- 
mans ceased  to  be  pupils,  and  became  teachers.  Nations,  like  men, 
have  their  mission.     Rome's  mission  was  to  give  laws  to  the  world. 

In  the  year  527  a.d.  Justinian  became  emperor  of  the  Roman 
empire  in  the  East.  He  almost  immediately  appointed  a  commis- 
sion, headed  by  the  great  lawyer  Tribonian,  to  collect  and  arrange 
in  a  systematic  manner  the  immense  mass  of  Roman  laws,  and 
the  writings  of  the  jurists.  The  undertaking  was  like  that  of  the 
Decemvirs  in  connection  with  the  Twelve  Tables  (see  p.  236), 
only  far  greater.  The  result  of  the  work  of  the  commission  was 
what  is  known  as  the  Corpus  Juris  Civilis,  or  "Body  of  the  Civil 
Law."  This  consisted  of  three  parts  :  the  Code,  the  Pandects 
and  the  Institutes?  The  Code  was  a  revised  and  compressed  col- 
lection of  all  the  laws,  instructions  to  judicial  officers,  and  opinions 
on  legal  subjects,  promulgated  by  the  different  emperors  since 

1  The  Vulgate,  which  is  the  version  still  used  in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church. 

2  A  later  work  called  the  Novels  comprised  the  laws  of  Justinian  subsequent 
to  the  completion  of  the  Code. 


i 


EDUCATION.  359 

the  time  of  Hadrian ;  the  Pandects  (all-containing)  were  a  digest 
or  abridgment  of  the  writings,  opinions,  and  decisions  of  the  most 
eminent  of  the  old  Roman  jurists  and  lawyers.  The  Institutes 
were  a  condensed  edition  of  the  Pandects,  and  were  intended  to 
form  an  elementary  text-book  for  the  use  of  students  in  the  great 
law-schools  of  the  empire. 

The  Body  of  the  Roman  Law  thus  preserved  and  transmitted 
was  the  great  contribution  of  the  Latin  intellect  to  civilization.  It 
has  exerted  a  profound  influence  upon  all  the  law-systems  of 
Europe.  Thus  does  the  once  little  Palatine  city  of  the  Tiber  still 
rule  the  world.  The  religion  of  Judea,  the  arts  of  Greece,  and 
the  laws  of  Rome  are  three  very  real  and  potent  elements  in 
modern  civilization. 

3.   Social  Life. 

Education.  —  Roman  children  were  subject  in  an  extraordinary 
manner  to  their  father  {paterfamilias).  They  were  regarded  as 
his  property,  and  their  life  and  liberty  were  in  general  at  his  abso- 
lute disposal.  This  power  he  exercised  by  usually  drowning  at 
birth  the  deformed  or  sickly  child.  Even  the  married  son  re- 
mained legally  subject  to  his  father,  who  could  banish  him,  sell 
him  as  a  slave,  or  even  put  him  to  death.  It  should  be  said,  how- 
ever, that  the  right  of  putting  to  death  was  seldom  exercised,  and 
that  in  the  time  of  the  empire  the  law  put  some  limitations  upon  it. 

The  education  of  the  Roman  boy  differed  from  that  of  the 
Greek  youth  in  being  more  practical.  The  Laws  of  the  Twelve 
Tables  were  committed  to  memory  ;  and  rhetoric  and  oratory  were 
given  special  attention,  as  a  mastery  of  the  art  of  public  speaking 
was  an  almost  indispensable  acquirement  for  the  Roman  citizen 
who  aspired  to  take  a  prominent  part  in  the  affairs  of  state. 

After  the  conquest  of  Magna  Graecia  and  of  Greece,  the  Romans 
were  brought  into  closer  relations  than  had  hitherto  existed  with 
Greek  culture.  The  Roman  youth  were  taught  the  language  of 
Athens,  often  to  the  neglect,  it  appears,  of  their  native  tongue. 
Young  men  belonging  to  families  of  means,  not  unusually  went  to 


360  SOCIAL   LIFE. 

Greece,  just  as  the  graduates  of  our  schools  go  to  Europe,  to  finish 
their  education.  Many  of  the  most  prominent  statesmen  of  Rome, 
as  for  instance  Cicero  and  Julius  Caesar,  received  the  advantages 
of  this  higher  training  in  the  schools  of  Greece. 

Somewhere  between  the  age  of  fourteen  and  eighteen  the  boy 
exchanged  his  purple-hemmed  toga,  or  gown,  for  one  of  white 
wool,  which  was  in  all  places  and  at  all  times  the  significant  badge 
of  Roman  citizenship. 

Social  Position  of  Woman. — Until  after  her  marriage,  the 
daughter  of  the  family  was  kept  in  almost  Oriental  seclusion. 
Marriage  gave  her  a  certain  freedom.  She  might  now  be  present 
at  the  races  of  the  circus  and  the  various  shows  of  the  theatre  and 
the  arena,  a  privilege  rarely  accorded  to  her  before  marriage.  In 
the  early  virtuous  period  of  the  Roman  state,  divorce  was  unusual, 
but  in  later  and  more  degenerate  times,  it  became  very  common. 
The  husband  had  the  right  to  divorce  his  wife  for  the  slightest 
cause,  or  for  no  cause  at  all.  In  this  disregard  of  the  sanctity  of 
the  family  relation,  may  doubtless  be  found  one  cause  of  the 
degeneracy  and  failure  of  the  Roman  stock. 

Public  Amusements. — The  entertainments  of  the  theatre,  the 
games  of  the  circus,  and  the  combats  of  the  amphitheatre  were 
the  three  principal  public  amusements  of  the  Romans.  These 
entertainments  in  general  increased  in  popularity  as  liberty  de- 
clined, the  great  festive  gatherings  at  the  various  places  of  amuse- 
ment taking  the  place  of  the  political  assemblies  of  the  republic. 
The  public  exhibitions  under  the  empire  were,  in  a  certain  sense, 
the  compensation  which  the  emperors  offered  the  people  for  their 
surrender  of  the  right  of  participation  in  public  affairs,  —  and  the 
people  were  content  to  accept  the  exchange. 

Tragedy  was  never  held  in  high  esteem  at  Rome  :  the  people 
saw  too  much  real  tragedy  in  the  exhibitions  of  the  amphitheatre 
to  care  much  for  the  make-believe  tragedies  of  the  stage.  The 
entertainments  of  the  theatres  usually  took  the  form  of  comedies, 
farces,  and  pantomimes.  The  last  were  particularly  popular,  both 
because  the  vast  size  of  the  theatres  made  it  quite  impossible  for 


GLADIATORIAL    COMBATS.  361 

the  actor  to  make  his  voice  heard  throughout  the  structure,  and 
for  the  reason  that  the  language  of  signs  was  the  only  language 
that  could  be  readily  understood  by  an  audience  made  up  of  so 
many  different  nationalities  as  composed  a  Roman  assemblage. 

More  important  and  more  popular  than  the  entertainments  of 
the  theatre  were  the  various  games,  especially  the  chariot  races,  of 
the  circus.  But  surpassing  in  their  terrible  fascination  all  other 
public  amusements  were  the  animal-baitings  and  the  gladiatorial 
combats  of  the  arena. 

The  beasts  required  for  the  baitings  were  secured  in  different 
parts  of  the  world,  and  transported  to  Rome  and  the  other  cities 
of  the  empire  at  an  enormous  expense.  The  wildernesses  of 
Northern  Europe  furnished  bears  and  wolves ;  Africa  contributed 
lions,  crocodiles,  and  leopards ;  Asia  elephants  and  tigers.  These 
creatures  were  pitted  against  one  another  in  every  conceivable 
way.  Often  a  promiscuous  multitude  would  be  turned  loose  in 
the  arena  at  once.  But  even  the  terrific  scene  that  then  ensued, 
became  at  last  too  tame  to  stir  the  blood  of  the  Roman  populace. 
Hence  a  new  species  of  show  was  introduced,  and  grew  rapidly 
into  favor  with  the  spectators  of  the  amphitheatre.  This  was  the 
gladiatorial  combat. 

The  Gladiatorial  Combats.  — Gladiatorial  games  seem  to  have 
had  their  origin  in  Etruria,  whence  they  were  brought  to  Rome. 
It  was  a  custom  among  the  early  Etruscans  to  slay  prisoners  upon 
the  warrior's  grave,  it  being  thought  that  the  spirit  of  the  dead 
delighted  in  the  blood  of  such  victims.  In  time  the.  condemned 
prisoners  were  allowed  to  fight  and  kill  one  another,  this  being 
deemed  more  humane  than  their  cold-blooded  slaughter.  Thus  it 
happened  that  sentiments  of  humanity  gave  rise  to  an  institution 
which,  afterwards  perverted,  became  the  most  inhuman  of  any 
that  ever  existed  among  a  civilized  people. 

The  first  gladiatorial  spectacle  at  Rome  was  presented  by  two 
sons  at  the  funeral  of  their  father,  in  the  year  264  B.C.  This  exhi- 
bition was  arranged  in  one  of  the  forums,  as  there  were  at  that 
time  no  amphitheatres  in  existence.     From  this  time  the  public 


362  SOCIAL   LIFE. 

taste  for  this  species  of  entertainment  grew  rapidly,  and  by  the 
beginning  of  the  imperial  period  had  mounted  into  a  perfect  pas- 
sion. It  was  now  no  longer  the  manes  of  the  dead,  but  the  spirits 
of  the  living,  that  they  were  intended  to  appease.  At  first  the 
combatants  were  slaves,  captives,  or  condemned  criminals ;  but  at 
last  knights,  senators,  and  even  women  descended  into  the  arena. 
Training-schools  were  established  at  Rome,  Capua,  Ravenna,  and 
other  cities.  Free  citizens  often  sold  themselves  to  the  keepers 
of  these  seminaries ;  and  to  them  flocked  desperate  men  of  all 
classes,  and  ruined  spendthrifts  of  the  noblest  patrician  houses. 
Slaves  and  criminals  were  encouraged  to  become  proficient  in 
this  art  by  the  promise  of  freedom  if  they  survived  the  combats 

beyond  a   certain   number 
of  years. 

Sometimes  the  gladiators 
fought  in  pairs  ;  again  great 
companies  engaged  at  once 
in  the  deadly  fray.  They 
*;  fought  in  chariots,  on  horse- 
back, on  foot  —  in  all  the 
ways  that  soldiers  were  ac- 
customed to  fight  in  actual 
battle.      The  contestants 

GLADiATORS.   (After  an  old  Mosaic.)  ^    ^^    ^    lancegj 

swords,  daggers,  tridents,  and  every  manner  of  weapon.  Some 
were  provided  with  nets  and  lassos,  with  which  they  entangled 
their  adversaries,  and  then  slew  them. 

The  life  of  a  wounded  gladiator  was  in  the  hands  of  the  audi- 
ence. If  in  response  to  his  appeal  for  mercy,  which  was  made  by 
outstretching  the  forefinger,  the  spectators  reached  out  their  hands 
with  thumbs  turned  down,  that  indicated  that  his  prayer  had  been 
heard  and  that  the  sword  was  to  be  sheathed ;  but  if  they  ex- 
tended their  hands  with  thumbs  turned  up,  that  was  the  signal  for 
the  victor  to  complete  his  work  upon  his  wounded  foe.  Some- 
times the  dying  were  aroused  and  forced  on  to  the  fight  by  burn- 
ing with  a  hot  iron.     The  dead  bodies  were  dragged  from  the 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  CORN.  363 

arena  with  hooks,  like  the  carcasses  of  animals,  and  the  pools  of 
blood  soaked  up  with  dry  sand. 

These  shows  increased  to  such  an  extent  that  they  entirely  over- 
shadowed the  entertainments  of  the  circus  and  the  theatre.  Am- 
bitious officials  and  commanders  arranged  such  spectacles  in  order 
to  curry  favor  with  the  masses  ;  magistrates  were  expected  to  give 
them  in  connection  with  the  public  festivals  ;  the  heads  of  aspiring 
families  exhibited  them  "  in  order  to  acquire  social  position  "  ; 
wealthy  citizens  prepared  them  as  an  indispensable  feature  of  a 
fashionable  banquet ;  the  children  caught  the  spirit  of  their  elders 
and  imitated  them  in  their  plays.  The  demand  for  gladiators  was 
met  by  the  training-schools ;  the  managers  of  these  hired  out 
bands  of  trained  men,  that  travelled  through  the  country  like 
opera  troupes  among  us,  and  gave  exhibitions  in  private  houses 
or  in  the  provincial  amphitheatres. 

The  rivalries  between  ambitious  leaders  during  the  later  years 
of  the  republic  tended  greatly  to  increase  the  number  of  gladiato- 
rial shows,  as  liberality  in  arranging  these  spectacles  was  a  sure 
passport  to  popular  favor.  It  was  reserved  for  the  emperors,  how- 
ever, to  exhibit  them  on  a  truly  imperial  scale.  Titus,  upon  the 
dedication  of  the  Flavian  Amphitheatre,  provided  games,  mostly 
gladiatorial  combats,  that  lasted  one  hundred  days.  Trajan  cele- 
brated his  victories  with  shows  that  continued  still  longer,  in  the 
progress  of  which  10,000  gladiators  fought  upon  the  arena,  and 
more  than  that  number  of  wild  beasts  were  slain.  (For  the  sup- 
pression of  the  gladiatorial  games,  see  p.  339.) 

State  Distribution  of  Corn.  —  The  free  distribution  of  corn  at 
Rome  has  been  characterized  as  the  H  leading  fact  of  Roman  life." 
It  will  be  recalled  that  this  pernicious  practice  had  its  beginnings 
in  the  legislation  of  Caius  Gracchus  (see  p.  276).  Just  before  the 
establishment  of  the  empire,  over  300,000  Roman  citizens  were 
recipients  of  this  state  bounty.  In  the  time  of  the  Antonines  the 
number  is  asserted  to  have  been  even  larger.  The  corn  for  this 
enormous  distribution  was  derived  in  large  part  from  a  grain  tribute 
exacted  of  the  African  and  other  corn-producing  provinces.     The 


364  SOCIAL   LIFE. 

evils  that  resulted  from  this  misdirected  state  charity  can  hardly 
be  overstated.  Idleness  and  all  its  accompanying  vices  were  fos- 
tered to  such  a  degree  that  we  probably  shall  not  be  wrong  in 
enumerating  the  practice  as  one  of  the  most  prominent  causes  of 
the  demoralization  of  society  at  Rome  under  the  emperors. 

Slavery.  —  A  still  more  demoralizing  element  in  Roman  life 
than  that  of  the  state  largesses  of  corn,  was  the  institution  of 
slavery.  The  number  of  slaves  in  the  Roman  state  under  the 
later  republic  and  the  earlier  empire  was  probably  as  great  or 
even  greater  than  the  number  of  freemen.  The  love  of  ostenta- 
tion led  to  the  multiplication  of  offices  in  the  households  of  the 
wealthy,  and  the  employment  of  a  special  slave  for  every  different 
kind  of  work.  Thus  there  was  the  slave  called  the  sandalio,  whose 
sole  duty  it  was  to  care  for  his  master's  sandals;  and  another, 
called  the  nomenclator,  whose  exclusive  business  it  was  to  accom- 
pany his  master  when  he  went  upon  the  street,  and  give  him  the 
names  of  such  persons  as  he  ought  to  recognize.  The  price  of 
slaves  varied  from  a  few  dollars  to  ten  or  twenty  thousand  dollars, 
—  these  last  figures  being  of  course  exceptional.  Greek  slaves 
were  the  most  valuable,  as  their  lively  intelligence  rendered  them 
serviceable  in  positions  calling  for  special  talent. 

The  slave  class  was  chiefly  recruited,  as  in  Greece,  by  war,  and 
by  the  practice  of  kidnapping.  Some  of  the  outlying  provinces  in 
Asia  and  Africa  were  almost  depopulated  by  the  slave  hunters. 
Delinquent  tax  payers  were  often  sold  as  slaves,  and  frequently 
poor  persons  sold  themselves  into  servitude. 

Slaves  were  treated  better  under  the  empire  than  under  the 
later  republic  (see  p.  273),  a  change  to  be  attributed  doubtless 
to  the  softening  influence  of  the  Stoical  philosophy  and  of  Chris- 
tianity. The  feeling  entertained  towards  this  unfortunate  class  in 
the  later  republican  period  is  illustrated  by  Varro's  classification 
of  slaves  as  "  vocal  agricultural  implements,"  and  again  by  Cato 
the  Elder's  recommendation  that  old  and  worn-out  slaves  be  sold, 
as  a  matter  of  economy.  Sick  and  hopelessly  infirm  slaves  were 
taken  to  an  island  in  the  Tiber  and  left  there  to  die  of  starvation 


SLAVERY. 


365 


and  exposure.  In  many  cases,  as  a  measure  of  precaution,  the 
slaves  were  forced  to  work  in  chains,  and  to  sleep  in  subterranean 
prisons.  Their  bitter  hatred  towards  their  masters,  engendered  by 
harsh  treatment,  is  witnessed  by  the  well-known  proverb,  "  As 
many  enemies  as  slaves,"  and  by  the  servile  revolts  and  wars  of 
the  republican  period.  But  from  the  first  century  of  the  empire 
there  is  observable  a  growing  sentiment  of  humanity  towards  the 
bondsman.  Imperial  edicts  take  away  from  the  master  the  right 
to  kill  his  slave,  or  to  sell  him  to  the  trader  in  gladiators,  or  even 
to  treat  him  with  any  undue  severity.  This  marks  the  beginning 
of  a  slow  reform  which  in  the  course  of  ten  or  twelve  centuries 
resulted  in  the  complete  abolition  of  slavery  in  Christian  Europe. 


ii  ftlii  t am  in  m i in  c  if 

...  U  \.,..,1 1*.,,,' !.„,«•  1  | 


SARCOPHAGUS   OF   CORNELIUS    SCIPIO    BARBATUS   (Consul  298  B.C.). 


Part    II. 

MEDIAEVAL    AND    MODERN  HISTORY. 


INTRODUCTION. 

Divisions  of  the  Subject.  —  As  we  have  already  noted,  the 
fourteen  centuries  since  the  fall  of  the  Roman  empire  in  the  West 
(a.d.  476)  are  usually  divided  into  two  periods, — the  Middle  Ages, 
or  the  period  lying  between  the  fall  of  Rome  and  the  discovery  of 
America  by  Columbus  in  1492,  and  the  Modern  Age,  which  ex- 
tends from  the  latter  event  to  the  present  time.  The  Middle 
Ages,  again,  naturally  subdivide  into  two  periods,  —  the  Dark 
Ages,  and  the  Age  of  Revival;  while  the  Modern  Age  also  falls 
into  two  divisions,  —  the  Era  of  the  Protestant  Reformation,  and 
the  Era  of  the  Political  Revolution. 

Chief  Characteristics  of  the  Four  Periods. — The  so-called 
Dark  Ages  embrace  the  years  intervening  between  the  fall  of 
Rome  and  the  opening  of  the  eleventh  century.  The  period  was 
one  of  origins,  —  of  the  beginnings  of  peoples  and  languages  and 
institutions.  During  this  time  arose  the  Papacy  and  Feudalism, 
the  two  great  institutions  of  the  Mediaeval  Ages. 

The  Age  of  Revival  begins  with  the  opening  of  the  eleventh 
century,  and  ends  with  the  discovery  of  America  by  Columbus  in 
1492.  During  all  this  time  civilization  was  making  slow  but  sure 
advances.  The  last  century  of  the  period,  especially,  was  marked 
by  a  great  revival  of  classical  learning  (known  as  the  Renaissance, 
or  New  Birth),  by  improvements,  inventions,  and  discoveries, 
which  greatly  stirred  men's  minds,  and  awakened  them  as  from  a 
sleep.  The  Crusades,  or  Holy  Wars,  were  the  most  remarkable 
undertakings  of  the  age. 


THE  FALL    OF  ROME.  367 

The  Era  of  the  Reformation  embraces  the  sixteenth  century 
and  the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth.  The  period  is  characterized 
by  the  great  religious  movement  known  as  the  Reformation,  and 
the  tremendous  struggle  between  Catholicism  and  Protestantism. 
Almost  all  the  wars  of  the  period  were  religious  wars.  The  last 
great  combat  was  the  Thirty  Years'  War  in  Germany,  which  was 
closed  by  the  celebrated  Peace  of  Westphalia,  in  1648.  After 
this  date  the  disputes  and  wars  between  parties  and  nations  were 
political  rather  than  religious  in  character. 

The  Era  of  the  Political  Revolution  extends  from  the  Peace  of 
Westphalia  to  the  present  time.  This  age  is  especially  marked  by 
the  great  conflict  between  despotic  and  liberal  principles  of  gov- 
ernment, resulting  in  the  triumph  of  democratic  ideas.  The 
central  event  of  the  period  is  the  French  Revolution. 

Having  now  made  a  general  survey  of  the  ground  we  are  to 
traverse,  we  must  return  to  our  starting-point,  —  the  fall  of  Rome. 

Relation  of  the  Fall  of  Rome  to  World-History.  —  The  ca- 
lamity which  in  the  fifth  century  befell  the  Roman  empire  in  the 
West  is  sometimes  represented  as  having  destroyed  the  treasures 
of  the  Old  World.  It  was  not  so.  All  that  was  really  valuable  in 
the  accumulations  of  antiquity  escaped  harm,  and  became  sooner 
or  later  the  possession  of  the  succeeding  ages.  The  catastrophe 
simply  prepared  the  way  for  the  shifting  of  the  scene  of  civiliza- 
tion from  the  south  to  the  north  of  Europe,  simply  transferred  at 
once  political  power,  and  gradually  social  and  intellectual  pre- 
eminence, from  one  branch  of  the  Aryan  family  to  another,  — 
from  the  Graeco-Italic  to  the  Teutonic. 

The  event  was  not  an  unrelieved  calamity,  because,  fortunately, 
the  floods  that  seemed  to  be  sweeping  so  much  away  were  not  the 
mountain  torrent,  which  covers  fruitful  fields  with  worthless  drift, 
but  the  overflowing  Nile  with  its  rich  deposits.  Over  all  the 
regions  covered  by  the  barbarian  inundation  a  new  stratum  of 
population  was  deposited,  a  new  soil  formed  that  was  capable 
of  nourishing  a  better  civilization  than  any  the  world  had  yet 
seen. 


368  INTR  OD  UC  TION. 

The  Three  Elements  of  Civilization.  —  We  must  now  notice 
what  survived  the  catastrophe  of  the  fifth  century,  what  it  was  that 
Rome  transmitted  to  the  new  rulers  of  the  world,  the  Teutonic 
race.  This  renders  necessary  an  analysis  of  the  elements  of 
civilization. 

Modern  civilization  is  the  result  of  the  blending  of  three  his- 
toric elements,  —  the  Classical,  the  Hebrew,  and  the  Teutonic. 

By  the  classical  element  in  civilization  is  meant  that  whole  body 
of  arts,  sciences,  literatures,  laws,  manners,  ideas,  and  social  arrange- 
ments, —  everything,  in  a  word,  save  Christianity,  that  Greece  and 
Rome  gave  to  mediaeval  and  modern  Europe.  Taken  together, 
these  things  constituted  a  valuable  gift  to  the  new  northern  race 
that  was  henceforth  to  represent  civilization. 

By  the  Hebrew  element  in  history  is  meant  Christianity.  This 
has  been  the  most  potent  factor  in  modern  civilization.  It  has  so 
colored  the  whole  life,  and  so  moulded  all  the  institutions  of  the 
European  people  that  their  history  is  very  largely  a  story  of  the 
fortunes  and  influences  of  this  religion,  which,  first  going  forth 
from  Judea,  was  given  to  the  younger  world  by  the  missionaries 
of  Rome. 

By  the  Teutonic  element  in  history  is  meant  of  course  the  Ger- 
manic race.  The  Teutons  were  poor  in  those  things  in  which  the 
Romans  were  rich.  They  had  neither  arts,  nor  sciences,  nor  phil- 
osophies, nor  literatures.  But  they  had  something  better  than  all 
these  ;  they  had  personal  worth.  Three  prominent  traits  of  theirs 
we  must  especially  notice  ;  namely,  their  capacity  for  civilization, 
their  love  of  personal  freedom,  and  their  reverence  for  woman- 
hood. 

The  Teutons  fortunately  belonged  to  a  progressive  family  of 
peoples.  As  Kingsley  puts  it,  they  came  of  a  royal  race.  They 
were  Aryans.  It  was  their  boundless  capacity  for  growth,  for 
culture,  for  civilization,  which  saved  the  countries  of  the  West 
from  the  sterility  and  barbarism  reserved  for  those  of  the  East 
that  were  destined  to  be  taken  possession  of  by  the  Turanian 
Turks. 


CELTS,  SLAVONIANS,  AND   OTHER  PEOPLES.  369 

The  Teutons  loved  personal  freedom.  They  never  called  any 
man  master,  but  followed  their  chosen  leader  as  companions  and 
equals.  They  could  not  even  bear  to  have  the  houses  of  their 
villages  set  close  together.  And  again  we  see  the  same  indepen- 
dent spirit  expressed  in  their  assemblies  of  freemen,  in  which 
meetings,  all  matters  of  public  interest  were  debated  and  decided. 
In  this  trait  of  the  Teutonic  disposition  lay  the  germ  of  represen- 
tative government  and  of  Protestant,  or  Teutonic  Christianity. 

A  feeling  of  respect  for  woman  characterized  all  the  northern, 
or  Teutonic  peoples.  Tacitus  says  of  the  Germans  that  they 
deemed  something  sacred  to  reside  in  woman's  nature.  This 
sentiment  guarded  the  purity  and  sanctity  of  the  home.  In  their 
high  estimation  of  the  sacredness  of  the  family  relation,  the  bar- 
barians stood  in  marked  contrast  with  the  later  Romans.  Our 
own  sacred  word  home,  as  well  as  all  that  it  represents,  comes 
from  our  Teutonic  ancestors. 

Celts,  Slavonians,  and  Other  Peoples.  —  Having  noticed  the 
Romans  and  Teutons,  the  two  most  prominent  peoples  that  pre- 
sent themselves  to  us  at  the  time  of  the  downfall  of  Rome,  if  we 
now  name  the  Celts,  the  Slavonians,  the  Persians,  the  Arabians, 
and  the  Turanian  tribes  of  Asia,  we  shall  have  under  view  the 
chief  actors  in  the  drama  of  mediaeval  and  modern  history. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  mediaeval  era  the  Celts  were  in 
front  of  the  Teutons,  clinging  to  the  western  edge  of  the  European 
continent,  and  engaged  in  a  bitter  contest  with  these  latter  peo- 
ples, which,  in  the  antagonism  of  England  and  Ireland,  was  des- 
tined to  extend  itself  to  our  own  day. 

The  Slavonians  were  in  the  rear  of  the  Teutonic  tribes,  press- 
ing them  on  even  as  the  Celts  in  front  were  struggling  to  resist 
their  advance.  These  peoples,  progressing  but  little  beyond  the 
pastoral  state  before  the  Modern  Age,  will  play  only  an  obscure 
part  in  the  events  of  the  mediaeval  era,  but  in  the  course  of  the 
modern  period  will  assume  a  most  commanding  position  among 
the  European  nations. 

The    Persians   were    in  their  old  seat   beyond  the    Euphrates, 


370  INTR  OD  UC  TION. 

maintaining  there  what  is  called  the  New  Persian  Empire,  the 
kings  of  which,  until  the  rise  of  the  Saracens  in  the  seventh 
century,  were  the  most  formidable  rivals  of  the  emperors  of 
Constantinople. 

The  Arabians  were  hidden  in  their  deserts ;  but  in  the  seventh 
century  we  shall  see  them,  animated  by -a  wonderful  religious 
fanaticism,  issue  from  their  peninsula  and  begin  a  contest  with 
the  Christian  nations  of  the  East  and  the  West  which,  in  its  vary- 
ing phases,  was  destined  to  fill  a  large  part  of  the  mediaeval 
period. 

The  Tartar  tribes  were  buried  in  Central  Asia.  They  will 
appear  late  in  the  eleventh  century,  proselytes  for  the  most  part 
of  Mohammedanism ;  and,  as  the  religious  ardor  of  the  Semitic 
Arabians  grows  cool,  we  shall  see  the  Crescent  upheld  by  these 
zealous  converts  of  another  race,  and  finally,  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  placed  by  the  Turks  upon  the  dome  of  St.  Sophia  in 
Constantinople. 

As  the  Middle  Ages  draw  to  a  close,  the  remote  nations  of  East- 
ern Asia  will  gradually  come  within  our  circle  of  vision ;  and,  as 
the  Modern  Age  dawns,  we  shall  catch  a  glimpse  of  new  continents 
and  strange  races  of  men  beyond  the  Atlantic. 


EUROPE 


IN-  THE  REIGN  OF 

THEODORIC 

C      A.  D.  500. 


|       1   Roman  Empire 

1       I    Teutonic  Settlements 

1      I    Celts 


SECTION  I  —  MEDIAEVAL   HISTORY. 

FIRST    PERIOD.  — THE   DARK   AGES. 

(FROM  THE  FALL  OF  ROME,  A.D.  476,  TO  THE  ELEVENTH  CENTURY.) 

CHAPTER   XXXII. 

THE  TEUTONIC  KINGDOMS. 

Introductory.  —  In  connection  with  the  history  of  the  break-up 
of  the  Roman  empire  in  the  West,  we  have  already  given  some 
account  of  the  migrations  and  settlements  of  the  German  tribes. 
In  the  present  chapter  we  shall  relate  briefly  the  political  fortunes, 
for  the  two  centuries  following  the  fall  of  Rome,  of  the  principal 
kingdoms  set  up  by  the  German  chieftains  in  the  different  prov- 
inces of  the  old  empire. 

Kingdom  of  the  Ostrogoths  (a.d.  493-554).  —  Odoacer  will  be 
recalled  as  the  barbarian  chief  who  dethroned  the  last  of  the 
Western  Roman  emperors  (see  p.  348).  His  feeble  government 
in  Italy  lasted  only  seventeen  years,  when  it  was  brought  to  a 
close  by  the  invasion  of  the  Ostrogoths  (Eastern  Goths)  under 
Theodoric,  the  greatest  of  their  chiefs,  who  set  up  in  Italy  a  new 
dominion,  known  as  the  Kingdom  of  the  Ostrogoths. 

The  reign  of  Theodoric  covered  thirty-three  years  —  years  of 
such  quiet  and  prosperity  as  Italy  had  not  known  since  the  happy 
era  of  the  Antonines.  The  king  made  good  his  promise  that  his 
reign  should  be  such  that  "  the  only  regret  of  the  people  should 
be  that  the  Goths  had  not  come  at  an  earlier  period." 

The  kingdom  established  by  the  rare  abilities   of  Theodoric 


372  THE    TEUTONIC  KINGDOMS. 

lasted  only  twenty-seven  years  after  his  death,  which  occurred  a.d. 
527.  Justinian,  emperor  of  the  East,  taking  advantage  of  that 
event,  sent  his  generals,  first  Belisarius  and  afterwards  Narses,  to 
deliver  Italy  from  the  rule  of  the  barbarians.  The  last  of  the 
Ostrogothic  kings  fell  in  battle,  and  Italy,  with  her  fields  ravaged 
and  her  cities  in  ruins,  was  reunited  to  the  empire  (a.d.  554). 

Kingdom  of  the  Visigoths  (a.d.  4 1 5-7 n).  — The  Visigoths 
(Western  Goths)  were  already  in  possession  of  Spain  and  Southern 
Gaul  at  the  time  of  the  fall  of  Rome.  Being  driven  south  of  the 
Pyrenees  by  Clovis,  king  of  the  Franks,  they  held  possession  of 
Spain  until  the  beginning  of  the  eighth  century,  when  the  Saracens 
crossed  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  destroyed  the  kingdom  of  Rod- 
erick, the  last  of  the  Gothic  kings,  and  established  throughout 
the  country  the  authority  of  the  Koran  (a.d.  711).  The  Visi- 
gothic  empire  when  thus  overturned  had  lasted  nearly  three 
hundred  years.  During  this  time  the  conquerors  had  mingled 
with  the  old  Romanized  inhabitants  of  Spain,  so  that  in  the  veins 
of  the  Spaniard  of  to-day  is  blended  the  blood  of  Iberian,  Celt, 
Roman,  and  Teuton,  together  with  that  of  the  last  comers,  the  Moors. 

Kingdom  of  the  Burgundians  (a.d.  443-534).  —  The  Burgun- 
dians,  who  were  near  kinsmen  of  the  Goths,  built  up  a  kingdom 
in  Southeastern  Gaul.  A  portion  of  this  ancient  domain  still 
retains,  from  these  German  settlers,  the  name  of  "Burgundy." 
The  Burgundians  soon  came  in  collision  with  the  Franks  on  the 
north,  and  were  reduced  by  the  Frankish  kings  to  a  state  of 
dependence. 

Kingdom  of  the  Vandals  (a.d.  429-533).  —  We  have  already 
spoken  of  the  establishment  in  North  Africa  of  the  kingdom  of 
the  Vandals,  and  told  how,  under  the  lead  of  their  king  Genseric, 
they  bore  in  triumph  down  the  Tiber  the  heavy  spoils  of  Rome, 
(seep.  346). 

Being  Arian  Christians,  the  Vandals  persecuted  with  furious 
zeal  the  orthodox  party,  the  followers  of  Athanasius.  Moved  by 
the  entreaties  of  the  African  Catholics,  the  Emperor  Justinian  sent 
his  general  Belisarius  to  drive  the  barbarians  from  Africa,  and  to 


THE  FRANKS. 


373 


restore  that  province  to  the  bosom  of  the  true  Catholic  Church. 
The  expedition  was  successful,  and  Carthage  and  the  fruitful  fields 
of  Africa  were  restored  to  the  em- 
pire, after  having  suffered  the  inso- 
lence of  the  barbarian  conquerors 
for  the  space  of  one  hundred  years. 
The  Vandals  remaining  in  the 
country  were  gradually  absorbed 
by  the  old  Roman  population,  and 
after  a  few  generations  no  certain 
trace  of  the  barbarian  invaders 
could  be  detected  in  the  physi- 
cal appearance,  the  language,  or 
the  customs  of  the  inhabitants  of 
the  African  coast.  The  Vandal 
nation  had  disappeared ;  the  name 
alone  remained. 

The  Franks  under  the  Mero- 
vingians (a.d.  486-752). — The 
Franks,  who  were  destined  to  give 
a  new  name  to  Gaul  and  form  the 
nucleus  of  the  French  nation, 
made  their  first  settlement  west 
of  the  Rhine  about  two  hundred 
years  before  the  fall  of  Rome. 
The  name  was  the  common  desig- 
nation of  a  number  of  Teutonic 
tribes  that  had  formed  a  confeder-  §«§ 
ation  while  dwelling  beyond  the 


Rhine.     The  Salian  Franks  were  £ 


the  leading  tribe  of  the  league, 
and  it  was  from  the  members  of 
their  most  powerful   family,    who 


CLOVIS  AND  THE  VASE  OF  SOISSONS. 
(After  a  drawing  by  Alphonse  de  Neuville.) 


1  The  story  of  the  Vase  of  Soissons  illustrates  at  once  the  customs  of  the 
Franks  and  the  power  and  personal  character  of  their  leader  Clovis.     Upon 


374  THE    TEUTONIC  KINGDOMS. 

traced  their  descent  from  Merovaeus,  a  legendary  sea-king  of  the 
Franks,  that  leaders  were  chosen  by  the  free  vote  of  all  the  war- 
riors. 

After  the  downfall  of  Rome,  Clovis,  then  chief  of  the  Franks, 
conceived  the  ambition  of  erecting  a  kingdom  upon  the  ruins  of 
the  Roman  power.  He  attacked  Syagrius,  the  Roman  governor 
of  Gaul,  and  at  Soissons  gained  a  decisive  victory  over  his  forces 
(a.d.  486).  Thus  was  destroyed  forever  in  Gaul  that  Roman 
authority  established  among  its  barbarous  tribes  more  than  five 
centuries  before  by  the  conquests  of  Julius  Caesar. 

During  his  reign,  Clovis  extended  his  authority  over  the  greater 
part  of  Gaul,  reducing  to  the  condition  of  tributaries  the  various 
Teutonic  tribes  that  had  taken  possession  of  different  portions  of 
the  country.  About  a  century  and  a  half  of  discord  followed  his 
energetic  rule,  by  the  end  of  which  time  the  princes  of  the  house 
of  Merovaeus  had  become  so  feeble  and  inefficient  that  they  were 
contemptuously  called  "do-nothings,"  and  an  ambitious  officer  of 
the  crown,  who  bore  the  title  of  Mayor  of  the  Palace,  pushed  aside 
his  imbecile  master,  and  gave  to  the  Frankish  monarchy  a  new 
royal  line,  —  the  Carolingian  (see  p.  404). 

Kingdom  of  the  Lombards  (a.d.  568-774).  —  The  circum- 
stances attending  the  establishment  of  the  Lombards  in  Italy 
were  very  like  those  marking  the  settlement  of  the  Ostrogoths. 
The  Lombards  (Langobardi),  so  called  either  from  their  long 
beards,  or  their  long  battle-axes,  came  from  the  region  of  the 
Upper  Danube.  In  just  such  a  march  as  the  Ostrogoths  had 
made  nearly  a  century  before,  the  Lombard  nation  crossed  the 
Alps  and  descended  upon  the  plains  of  Italy.     After  many  years 

the  division  at  Soissons  of  some  spoils,  Clovis  asked  his  followers  to  set  aside 
a  rule  whereby  they  divided  the  booty  by  lot,  and  to  let  him  have  a  certain 
beautiful  vase.  One  of  his  followers  objected,  and  broke  the  vase  to  pieces 
with  his  battle-axe.  Clovis  concealed  his  anger  at  the  time,  but  some  time 
afterwards,  when  reviewing  his  troops,  he  approached  the  man  who  had  of- 
fended him,  and  chiding  him  for  not  keeping  his  arms  bright,  cleft  his  head 
with  a  battle-axe,  at  the  same  time  exclaiming,  "  Thus  didst  thou  to  the  vase 
of  Soissons." 


THE  ANGLO-SAXONS  IN  BRITAIN  375 

of  desperate  righting,  they  wrested  from  the  empire 1  all  the  penin- 
sula save  some  of  the  great  cities,  and  set  up  in  the  country  a 
monarchy  which  lasted  almost  exactly  two  centuries. 

The  rule  of  the  Lombard  princes  was  brought  to  an  end  by 
Charlemagne,  the  greatest  of  the  Frankish  rulers  (see  p.  405); 
but  the  blood  of  the  invaders  had  by  this  time  become  inter- 
mingled with  that  of  the  former  subjects  of  the  Roman  empire, 
so  that  throughout  all  that  part  of  the  peninsula  which  is  still 
called  Lombardy  after  them,  the  people  at  the  present  day  reveal, 
in  the  light  hair  and  fair  features  which  distinguish  them  from  the 
inhabitants  of  Southern  Italy,  their  partly  German  origin. 

The  Anglo-Saxons  in  Britain.  —  We  have  already  seen  how  in 
the  time  of  Rome's  distress  the  Angles  and  Saxons  secured  a  foot- 
hold in  Britain  (see  p.  344).  The  advance  of  the  invaders  here 
was  stubbornly  resisted  by  the  half-Romanized  Celts  of  the  island. 
At  the  end  of  a  century  and  a  half  of  fighting,  the  German  tribes 
had  gained  possession  of  only  the  eastern  half  of  what  is  now  Eng- 
land. On  the  conquered  soil  they  set  up  eight  or  nine,  or  perhaps 
more,  petty  kingdoms.  For  the  space  of  two  hundred  years  there 
was  an  almost  perpetual  strife  among  these  states  for  supremacy. 
Finally  Egbert,  king  of  the  West  Saxons,  brought  all  the  other 
states  into  a  subject  or  tributary  condition,  and  became  the  first 
king  of  the  English,  and  the  founder  of  the  long  line  of  Saxon 
monarchs  (a.d.  827). 

Teutonic  Tribes  outside  the  Empire.  —  We  have  now  spoken 
of  the  most  important  of  the  Teutonic  tribes  that  forced  them- 
selves within  the  limits  of  the  Roman  empire  in  the  West,  and 
that  there,  upon  the  ruins  of  the  civilization  they  had  overthrown, 
laid  or  helped  to  lay  the  foundations  of  the  modern  nations  of 
Italy,  Spain,  France,  and  England.  Beyond  the  boundaries  of  the 
old  empire  were  still  other  tribes  and  clans  of  this  same  mighty 

1  Italy,  it  will  be  borne  in  mind,  had  but  recently  been  delivered  from  the 
hands  of  the  Ostrogoths  by  the  lieutenants  of  the  Eastern  emperor  (see  p. 
372)- 


376  THE    TEUTONIC  KINGDOMS. 

family  of  nations,  —  tribes  and  clans  that  were  destined  to  play 
great  parts  in  European  history. 

On  the  east,  beyond  the  Rhine,  were  the  ancestors  of  the 
modern  Germans.  Notwithstanding  the  immense  hosts  that  the 
forests  and  morasses  of  Germany  had  poured  into  the  Roman 
provinces,  the  Father-land,  in  the  sixth  century  of  our  era,  seemed 
still  as  crowded  as  before  the  great  migration  began.  These  tribes 
were  yet  savages  in  manners  and  for  the  most  part  pagans  in 
religion. 

In  the  northwest  of  Europe  were  the  Scandinavians,  the  ances- 
tors of  the  modern  Danes,  Swedes,  and  Norwegians.  They  were 
as  yet  untouched  either  by  the  civilization  or  the  religion  of  Rome. 
We  shall  scarcely  get  a  glimpse  of  them  before  the  ninth  century, 
when  they  will  appear  as  the  Northmen,  the  dreaded  corsairs  of 
the  northern  seas. 


INTR  OD  UC  TOR  Y.  377 


CHAPTER    XXXIII. 

THE  CONVERSION  OF  THE  BARBARIANS. 

Introductory.  —  The  most  important  event  in  the  history  of  the 
tribes  that  took  possession  of  the  Roman  empire  in  the  West 
was  their  conversion  to  Christianity.  Many  of  the  barbarians 
were  converted  before  or  soon  after  their  entrance  into  the  em- 
pire ;  to  this  circumstance  the  Roman  provinces  owed  their  im- 
munity from  the  excessive  cruelties  which  pagan  barbarians  seldom 
fail  to  inflict  upon  a  subjected  enemy.  Alaric  left  untouched  the 
treasures  of  the  churches  of  the  Roman  Christians,  because  his 
own  faith  was  also  Christian  (see  p.  342).  For  like  reason  the 
Vandal  king  Genseric  yielded  to  the  prayers  of  Pope  Leo  the 
Great,  and  promised  to  leave  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  Imperial 
City  their  lives  (see  p.  346).  The  more  tolerable  fate  of  Italy, 
Spain,  and  Gaul,  as  compared  with  the  hard  fate  of  Britain,  is 
owing,  in  part  at  least,  to  the  fact  that  the  tribes  which  overran 
those  countries  had  become,  in  the  main,  converts  to  Christianity 
before  they  crossed  the  boundaries  of  the  empire,  while  the  Saxons, 
when  they  entered  Britain,  were  still  untamed  pagans. 

Conversion  of  the  Goths,  Vandals,  and  Other  Tribes. — The 
first  converts  to  Christianity  among  the  barbarians  beyond  the 
limits  of  the  empire  were  won  from  among  the  Goths.  Foremost 
of  the  apostles  that  arose  among  them  was  Ulfilas,  who  translated 
the  Scriptures  into  the  Gothic  language,  omitting  from  his  version, 
however,  "the  Book  of  Kings,"  as  he  feared  that  the  stirring 
recital  of  wars  and  battles  in  that  portion  of  the  Word  might 
kindle  into  too  fierce  a  flame  the  martial  ardor  of  his  new  con- 
verts. 

When  the  Visigoths,  distressed  by  the  Huns,  besought  the  East- 
ern Emperor  Valens  for  permission  to  cross  the  Danube,  one  of 


378  CONVERSION  OF   THE  BARBARIANS. 

the  conditions  imposed  upon  them  was  that  they  should  all  be 
baptized  in  the  Christian  faith  (see  p.  336).  This  seems  to  have 
crowned  the  work  that  had  been  going  on  among  them  for  some 
time,  and  thereafter  they  were  called  Christians. 

What  happened  to  the  Goths  happened  also  to  most  of  the 
barbarian  tribes  that  participated  in  the  overthrow  of  the  Roman 
empire  in  the  West.  By  the  time  of  the  fall  of  Rome,  the  Goths, 
the  Vandals,  the  Suevi,  the  Burgundians,  had  all  become  proselytes 
to  Christianity.  The  greater  part  of  them,  however,  professed 
the  Arian  creed,  which  had  been  condemned  by  the  great 
council  of  the  church  held  at  Nicsea  during  the  reign  of  Con- 
stantine  the  Great  (see  p.  332).  Hence  they  were  regarded  as 
heretics  by  the  Roman  Church,  and  all  had  to  be  reconverted  to 
the  orthodox  creed,  which  was  gradually  effected. 

The  remaining  Teutonic  tribes  of  whose  conversion  we  shall 
speak,  —  the  Franks,  the  Anglo-Saxons,  the  Scandinavians,  and  the 
chief  tribes  of  Germany,  —  embraced  at  the  outset  the  Catholic 
faith. 

Conversion  of  the  Franks. — The  Franks,  when  they  entered 
the  empire,  like  the  Angles  and  Saxons  when  they  landed  in 
Britain,  were  still  pagans.  Christianity  gained  way  very  slowly 
among  them  until  a  supposed  interposition  by  the  Christian  God 
in  their  behalf  led  the  king  and  nation  to  adopt  the  new  religion 
in  place  of  their  old  faith.  The  circumstances  were  these.  In 
the  year  496  of  our  era,  the  Alemanni  crossed  the  Rhine  and  fell 
upon  the  Franks.  A  desperate  battle  ensued.  In  the  midst  of  it, 
Clovis,  falling  upon  his  knees,  called  upon  the  God  of  the  Chris- 
tians, and  solemnly  vowed  that  if  He  would  give  victory  to  his 
arms,  he  would  become  his  faithful  follower.  The  battle  turned  in 
favor  of  the  Franks,  and  Clovis,  faithful  to  his  vow,  was  baptized, 
and  with  him  several  thousand  of  his  warriors.  This  incident  illus- 
trates how  the  very  superstitions  of  the  barbarians,  their  belief  in 
omens  and  divine  interpositions,  contributed  to  their  conversion. 

Augustine's  Mission  to  the  Angles  and  Saxons  in  Britain.  — 
In  the  year  596  Pope  Gregory  I.  sent  the  monk  Augustine  with 


THE   CELTIC   CHURCH.  379 

a  band  of  forty  companions  to  teach  the  Christian  faith  in  Britain. 
Gregory  had  become  interested  in  the  inhabitants  of  that  remote 
region  in  the  following  way.  One  day,  some  years  before  his  ele- 
vation to  the  papal  chair,  he  was  passing  through  the  slave-market 
at  Rome,  and  noticed  there  some  English  captives,  whose  fair 
features  awakened  his  curiosity  respecting  them.  Inquiring  of 
what  nation  they  were,  he  was  told  that  they  were  called  Angles. 
"  Right,"  said  he,  "  for  they  have  an  angelic  face,  and  it  becomes 
such  to  become  co-heirs  with  the  angels  in  heaven."  A  little  while 
afterwards  he  was  elected  Pope,  and  still  mindful  of  the  incident 
of  the  slave-market,  he  sent  to  the  Angles  the  embassy  to  which 
we  have  alluded. 

The  monks  were  favorably  received  by  the  English,  who  listened 
attentively  to  the  story  the  strangers  had  come  to  tell  them,  and 
being  persuaded  that  the  tidings  were  true,  they  burned  the  tem- 
ples of  Woden  and  Thor,  and  were  in  large  numbers  baptized  in 
the  Christian  faith. 

The  Celtic  Church.  —  It  here  becomes  necessary  for  us  to  say  a 
word  respecting  the  Celtic  Church.  Christianity,  it  must  be  borne 
in  mind,  held  its  place  among  the  Celts  whom  the  Saxons  crowded 
slowly  westward.  Now,  during  the  very  period  that  England  was 
being  wrested  from  the  Celtic  warriors,  the  Celtic  missionaries 
were  effecting  the  spiritual  conquest  of  Ireland.  Among  these 
messengers  of  the  Cross,  was  a  zealous  priest  named  Patricius, 
better  known  as  Saint  Patrick,  the  patron  saint  of  the  Irish. 

Never  did  any  race  receive  the  Gospel  with  more  ardent  enthu- 
siasm. The  Irish  Church  sent  out  its  devoted  missionaries  into 
the  Pictish  Highlands,  into  the  forests  of  Germany,  and  among 
the  wilds  of  Alps  and  Apennines.  "  For  a  time  it  seemed,"  says 
the  historian  Green,  "  that  the  course  of  the  world's  history  was  to 
be  changed  ;  as  if  the  older  Celtic  race  that  Roman  and  German 
had  driven  before  them  had  turned  to  the  moral  conquest  of  their 
conquerors ;  as  if  Celtic,  and  not  Latin,  Christianity  was  to  mould 
the  destinies  of  the  churches  of  the  West." 

Among  the   numerous  religious  houses  founded  by  the  Celtic 


380  CONVERSION  OF  THE  BARBARIANS. 

missionaries  was  the  famous  monastery  established  about  a.d.  564 
by  the  Irish  monk  Saint  Columba,  on  the  little  isle  of  Iona,  just 
off  the  Pictish  coast.  Iona  became  a  most  renowned  centre  of 
Christian  learning  and  missionary  zeal,  and  for  almost  two  centu- 
ries was  the  point  from  which  radiated  light  through  the  darkness 
of  the  surrounding  heathenism.  Fitly  has  it  been  called  the 
Nursery  of  Saints  and  the  Oracle  of  the  West. 

Rivalry  between  the  Roman  and  the  Celtic  Church.  —  Now, 
from  the  very  moment  that  Augustine  touched  the  shores  of  Brit- 
ain and  summoned  the  Welsh  clergy  to  acknowledge  the  discipline 
of  the  Roman  Church,  there  had  been  a  growing  jealousy  between 
the  Latin  and  the  Celtic  Church,  which  by  this  time  had  risen 
into  the  bitterest  rivalry  and  strife.  So  long  had  the  Celtic  Church 
been  cut  off  from  all  relations  with  Rome,  that  it  had  come  to 
differ  somewhat  from  it  in  the  matter  of  certain  ceremonies  and 
observances,  such  as  the  time  of  keeping  Easter  and  the  form  of 
the  tonsure.  Furthermore,  it  was  inclined  to  look  upon  St.  John 
rather  than  upon  St.  Peter  as  the  apostle  of  pre-eminence. 

The  Council  of  Whitby  (a.d.  664).  —  With  a  view  to  settling 
the  quarrel  Oswy,  king  of  Northumbria,  called  a  synod  composed 
of  representatives  of  both  parties,  at  the  monastery  of  Whitby. 
The  chief  question  of  debate,  which  was  argued  before  the  king 
by  the  ablest  advocates  of  both  Churches,  was  the  proper  time  for 
the  observance  of  Easter.  Finally  Wilfred,  the  speaker  for  the 
Roman  party,  happening  to  quote  the  words  of  Christ  to  Peter, 
"To  thee  will  I  give  the  keys  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven,"  the 
king  asked  the  Celtic  monks  if  these  words  were  really  spoken  by 
Christ  to  that  apostle,  and  upon  their  admitting  that  they  were, 
Oswy  said,  "  He  being  the  door-keeper,  ...  I  will  in  all  things 
obey  his  decrees,  lest  when  I  come  to  the  gates  of  the  kingdom 
of  heaven,  there  should  be  none  to  open  them."1 

The  decision  of  the  prudent  Oswy  gave  the  British  Isles  to 
Rome ;  for  not  only  was  all  England  quickly  won  to  the  Roman 
side,  but  the  Celtic  churches  and  monasteries  of  Wales  and  Ire- 

1  Bede's  Eccl.  Hist.  III.  25. 


THE  ROMAN   VICTORY.  381 

land  and  Scotland  soon  came  to  conform  to  the  Roman  standard 
and  custom.  "By  the  assistance  of  our  Lord,"  says  the  pious 
Latin  chronicler,  "the  monks  were  brought  to  the  canonical 
observation  of  Easter,  and  the  right  mode  of  the  tonsure." 

The  Roman  Victory  Fortunate  for  England. — There  is  no 
doubt  but  that  it  was  very  fortunate  for  England  that  the  contro- 
versy turned  as  it  did.  For  one  of  the  most  important  of  the 
consequences  of  the  conversion  of  Britain  was  the  re-establishment 
of  that  connection  of  the  island  with  Roman  civilization  which 
had  been  severed  by  the  calamities  of  the  fifth  century.  As  Green 
says,  —  he  is  speaking  of  the  embassy  of  St.  Augustine,  —  "  The 
march  of  the  monks  as  they  chanted  their  solemn  litany  was  in 
one  sense  a  return  of  the  Roman  legions  who  withdrew  at  the 
trumpet  call  of  Alaric.  .  .  .  Practically  Augustine's  landing 
renewed  that  union  with  the  western  world  which  the  landing  of 
Hengest  had  destroyed.  The  new  England  was  admitted  into 
the  older  Commonwealth  of  nations.  The  civilization,  art,  letters, 
which  had  fled  before  the  sword  of  the  English  conquerors 
returned  with  the  Christian  faith." 

Now  all  this  advantage  would  have  been  lost  had  Iona  instead 
of  Rome  won  at  Whitby.  England  would  have  been  isolated  from 
the  world,  and  would  have  had  no  part  or  lot  in  that  rich  common 
life  which  was  destined  to  the  European  peoples  as  co-heirs  of 
the  heritage  bequeathed  to  them  by  the  dying  empire. 

A  second  valuable  result  of  the  Roman  victory  was  the  hasten- 
ing of  the  political  unity  of  England  through  its  ecclesiastical 
unity.  The  Celtic  Church,  in  marked  contrast  with  the  Latin, 
was  utterly  devoid  of  capacity  for  organization.  It  could  have 
<lone  nothing  in  the  way  of  developing  among  the  several  Anglo- 
Saxon  states  the  sentiment  of  nationality.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  Roman  Church,  through  the  exercise  of  a  central  authority, 
through  national  synods  and  general  legislation,  overcame  the 
isolation  of  the  different  kingdoms,  and  helped  powerfully  to  draw 
them  together  into  a  common  political  life. 

The  Conversion  of  Germany.  —  The  conversion  of  the  tribes  of 


382  CONVERSION  OF  THE  BARBARIANS. 

Germany  was  effected  by  Celtic,  Anglo-Saxon,  and  Frankish  mis- 
sionaries,—  and  the  sword  of  Charlemagne  (seep.  406).  The 
great  apostle  of  Germany  was  the  Saxon  Winfred,  or  Winifred,  bet- 
ter known  as  St.  Boniface.  During  a  long  and  intensely  active  life 
he  founded  schools  and  monasteries,  organized  churches,  preached 
and  baptized;  and  at  last  died  a  martyr's  death^A.D.  753). 

The  christianizing  of  the  tribes  of  Germany  relieved  the  Teu- 
tonic states  of  Western  Europe  from  the  constant  peril  of  massacre 
by  their  heathen  kinsmen,  and  erected  a  strong  barrier  in  Central 
Europe  against  the  advance  of  the  waves  of  Turanian  paganism 
and  Mohammedanism  which  for  centuries  beat  so  threateningly 
against  the  eastern  frontiers  of  Germany.1 

Christianity  in  the  North.  —  The  progress  of  Christianity  in 
the  North  was  slow :  but  gradually,  during  the  ninth,  tenth,  and 
eleventh  centuries,  the  missionaries  of  the  Church  won  over  all 
the  Scandinavian  peoples.  One  important  effect  of  their  conver- 
sion was  the  checking  of  their  piratical  expeditions,  which  pre- 
viously had  vexed  almost  every  shore  to  the  south. 

By  the  opening  of  the  fourteenth  century  all  Europe  was  claimed 
by  Christianity,  save  a  limited  district  in  Southern  Spain  held  by 
the  Moors,  and  another  in  the  Baltic  regions  possessed  by  the  still 
pagan  Finns  and  Lapps. 

Monasticism.  —  It  was  during  this  very  conflict  with  the  bar- 
barians that  the  Church  developed  the  remarkable  institution 
known  as  Monasticism,  which  denotes  a  life  of  seclusion  from  the 
world,  with  the  object  of  promoting  the  interests  of  the  soul.  The 
central  idea  of  the  system  is,  that  the  body  is  a  weight  upon  the 
spirit,  and  that  to  "mortify  the  flesh  "  is  a  prime  duty. 

The  monastic  system  embraced  two  prominent  classes  of  ascetics  : 

1  The  conversion  of  Russia  dates  from  about  the  close  of  the  tenth  century. 
Its  evangelization  was  effected  by  the  missionaries  of  Constantinople,  that  is, 
of  the  Greek,  or  Eastern  Church.  Of  the  Turanian  tribes,  only  the  Hunga- 
rians, or  Magyars,  embraced  Christianity.  All  the  other  Turanian  peoples 
that  appeared  on  the  eastern  edge  of  Europe  during  the  Middle  Ages,  came 
as  pagan  or  Moslem  enemies. 


MONASTICISM.  383 

i.  Hermits,  or  anchorites,  persons  who,  retiring  from  the  world, 
lived  solitary  lives  in  desolate  places ;  2.  Cenobites,  or  monks, 
who  formed  communities  and  lived  under  a  common  roof. 

St.  Antony,  an  Egyptian  ascetic,  who  by  his  example  and  influ- 
ence gave  a  tremendous  impulse  to  the  strange  enthusiasm,  is 
called  the  "  father  of  the  hermits."  The  persecutions  that  arose 
under  the  Roman  emperors,  driving  thousands  into  the  deserts, 
contributed  vastly  to  the  movement.  The  cities  of  Egypt  became 
almost  emptied  of  their  Christian  population. 

About  the  close  of  the  fourth  century  the  cenobite  system  was 
introduced  into  Europe,  and  in  an  astonishingly  short  space  of 
time  spread  throughout  all  the  western  countries  where  Christianity 
had  gained  a  foothold.  Monasteries  arose  on  every  side,  in  the 
wilds  of  the  desert  and  in  the  midst  of  the  crowded  city.  The 
number  that  fled  to  these  retreats  was  vastly  augmented  by  the 
disorder  and  terror  attending  the  invasion  of  the  barbarians  and 
the  overthrow  of  the  empire  in  the  West. 

With  the  view  of  introducing  some  sort  of  system  and  uniformity 
among  the  numerous  communities,  fraternities  or  associations  were 
early  organized  and  spread  rapidly.  The  three  essential  vows  re- 
quired of  their  members  were  poverty,  chastity,  and  obedience. 
The  most  celebrated  of  these  fraternities  was  the  Order  of  the 
Benedictines,  so  called  from  its  founder  St.  Benedict  (a.d.  480- 
543).  This  order  became  immensely  popular.  At  one  time  it 
embraced  about  40,000  abbeys. 

Advantages  of  the  Monastic  System.  — The  early  establishment 
of  the  monastic  system  in  the  Church  resulted  in  great  advantages 
to  the  new  world  that  was  shaping  itself  out  of  the  ruins  of  the  old. 

The  monks  became  missionaries,  and  it  was  largely  to  their  zeal 
and  devotion  that  the  Church  owed  her  speedy  and  signal  victory 
over  the  barbarians ;  they  also  became  teachers,  and  under  the 
shelter  of  the  monasteries  established  schools  which  were  the  nur- 
series of  learning  during  the  Middle  Ages ;  they  became  copyists, 
and  with  great  care  and  industry  gathered  and  multiplied  ancient 
manuscripts,  and  thus  preserved  and  transmitted  to  the  modern 


384  CONVERSION  OF  THE   BARBARIANS. 

world  much  classical  learning  and  literature  that  would  otherwise 
have  been  lost;  they  became  agriculturists,  especially  the  Bene- 
dictines, and  by  skilful  labor  converted  the  wilderness  about  their 
retreats  into  fair  gardens,  thus  redeeming  from  barrenness  some  of 
the  most  desolate  districts  of  Europe ;  they  became  further  the 
almoners  of  the  pious  and  the  wealthy,  and  distributed  alms  to 
the  poor  and  needy.  Everywhere  the  monasteries  opened  their 
hospitable  doors  to  the  weary,  the  sick,  and  the  discouraged.  In 
a  word,  these  retreats  were  the  inns,  the  asylums,  and  the  hospitals, 
as  well  as  the  schools  of  learning  and  the  nurseries  of  religion,  of 
mediaeval  Europe.  Nor  should  we  fail  to  mention  how  the  asceti- 
cism of  the  monks  checked  those  flagrant  social  evils  that  had 
sapped  the  strength  of  the  Roman  race,  and  which  uncounteracted 
would  have  contaminated  and  weakened  the  purer  peoples  of  the 
North ;  nor  how,  through  its  requirements  of  self-control  and 
self-sacrifice,  it  gave  prominence  to  the  inner  life  of  the  spirit. 

Conclusion.  —  With  a  single  word  or  two  respecting  the  gen- 
eral consequences  of  the  conversion  to  Christianity  of  the  Teu- 
tonic tribes,  we  will  close  the  present  chapter. 

The  adoption  of  a  common  faith  by  the  European  peoples  drew 
them  together  into  a  sort  of  religious  brotherhood,  and  rendered 
it  possible  for  the  continent  to  employ  its  undivided  strength,  dur- 
ing the  succeeding  centuries,  in  staying  the  threatening  progress 
toward  the  West  of  the  colossal  Mohammedan  power  of  the  East. 
The  Christian  Church  set  in  the  midst  of  the  seething,  martial 
nations  and  races  of  Europe  an  influence  that  fostered  the  gentler 
virtues,  and  a  power  that  was  always  to  be  found  on  the  side  of 
order,  and  usually  of  mercy.  It  taught  the  brotherhood  of  man, 
the  essential  equality  in  the  sight  of  God  of  the  high  and  the  low, 
and  thus  pleaded  powerfully  and  at  last  effectually  for  the  freedom 
of  the  slave  and  the  serf.  It  prepared  the  way  for  the  introduc- 
tion among  the  barbarians  of  the  arts,  the  literature,  and  the  cult- 
ure of  Rome,  and  contributed  powerfully  to  hasten  the  fusion 
into  a  single  people  of  the  Latins  and  Teutons,  of  which  import- 
ant matter  we  shall  treat  in  the  following  chapter. 


ROMANCE  NATIONS.  385 


CHAPTER   XXXIV. 

FUSION  OF  THE   LATIN  AND  TEUTONIC  PEOPLES. 

Introductory.  —  Having  seen  how  the  Hebrew  element,  that 
is,  the  ideas,  beliefs,  and  sentiments  of  Christianity,  became  the 
common  possession  of  the  Latins  and  Teutons,  it  yet  remains  to 
notice  how  these  two  races,  upon  the  soil  of  the  old  empire, 
intermingled  their  blood,  their  language,  their  laws,  their  usages 
and  customs,  to  form  new  peoples,  new  tongues,  and  new  institu- 
tions. 

The  Romance  Nations.  —  In  some  districts  the  barbarian 
invaders  and  the  Roman  provincials  were  kept  apart  for  a  long 
time  by  the  bitter  antagonism  of  race,  and  a  sense  of  injury  on 
the  one  hand  and  a  feeling  of  disdainful  superiority  on  the  other. 
But  for  the  most  part  the  Teutonic  intruders  and  the  Latin-speak- 
ing inhabitants  of  Italy,  Spain,  and  Gaul  very  soon  began  freely 
to  mingle  their  blood  by  family  alliances.  It  is  quite  impossible 
to  say  what  proportion  the  Teutons  bore  to  the  Romans.  Of 
course  the  proportion  varied  in  the  different  countries.  In  none 
of  the  countries  named,  however,  was  it  large  enough  to  absorb 
the  Latinized  population ;  on  the  contrary,  the  barbarians  were 
themselves  absorbed,  yet  not  without  changing  very  essentially  the 
body  into  which  they  were  incorporated.  By  the  close  of  the 
ninth  century  the  two  elements  had  become  quite  intimately 
blended,  and  a  century  or  two  later  Roman  and  Teuton  have 
alike  disappeared,  and  we  are  introduced  to  Italians,  Spaniards, 
and  Frenchmen.  These  we  call  Romance  nations,  because  at 
base  they  are  Roman.1 

1  Britain  did  not  become  a  Romance  nation  on  account  of  the  nature  of 
the  barbarian  conquest  of  that  island.  The  Romanized  provincials,  as  has 
been  seen,  were  there  almost  destroyed  by  the  fierce  Teutonic  invaders. 


386  THE  LATIN  AND    TEUTONIC  PEOPLES. 

The  Formation  of  the  Romance  Languages.  —  During  the  five 
centuries  of  their  subjection  to  Rome,  the  natives  of  Spain  and 
Gaul  forgot  their  barbarous  dialects  and  came  to  speak  a  corrupt 
Latin.  Now  in  exactly  the  same  way  that  the  dialects  of  the 
Celtic  tribes  of  Gaul  and  of  the  Celtiberians  of  Spain  had  given 
way  to  the  more  refined  speech  of  the  Romans,  did  the  rude  lan- 
guages of  the  Teutons  yield  to  the  more  cultured  speech  of  the 
Roman  provincials.  In  the  course  of  two  or  three  centuries  after 
their  entrance  into  the  empire,  Goths,  Lombards,  Burgundians, 
and  Franks  had,  in  a  large  measure,  dropped  their  own  tongue, 
and  were  speaking  that  of  the  people  they  had  subjected.  But  of 
course  this  provincial  Latin  underwent  a  great  change  upon  the 
lips  of  the  mixed  descendants  of  the  Romans  and  Teutons.  Owing 
to  the  absence  of  a  common  popular  literature,  the  changes  that 
took  place  in  one  country  did  not  exactly  correspond  to  those 
going  on  in  another.  Hence,  in  the  course  of  time,  we  find  dif- 
ferent dialects  springing  up,  and  by  about  the  ninth  century  the 
Latin  has  virtually  disappeared  as  a  spoken  language,  and  its  place 
been  usurped  by  what  will  be  known  as  the  Italian,  Spanish,  and 
French  languages,  all  more  or  less  resembling  the  ancient  Latin, 
and  all  called  Romance  tongues,  because  children  of  the  old 
Roman  speech. 

Personal  Character  of  the  Teutonic  Legislation.  —  The  legisla- 
tion of  the  barbarians  was  generally  personal  instead  of  territorial, 
as  with  us  ;  that  is,  instead  of  all  the  inhabitants  of  a  given  country 
being  subject  to  the  same  laws,  there  were  different  ones  for  the 
different  classes  of  society.  The  Latins,  for  instance,  were  sub- 
ject in  private  law  only  to  the  old  Roman  code,  while  the  Teutons 
lived  under  the  rules  and  regulations  which  they  had  brought  with 
them  from  beyond  the  Rhine. 

Even  among  themselves  the  Teutons  knew  nothing  of  the  mod- 
ern legal  maxim  that  all  should  stand  equal  before  the  law.  The 
penalty  inflicted  upon  the  evil-doer  depended,  not  upon  the  nature 
of  his  crime,  but  upon  his  rank,  or  that  of  the  party  injured.  Thus 
slaves   and  serfs   could   be   beaten    and   put  to  death  for  minor 


ORDEALS.  387 

offences,  while  a  freeman  might  atone  for  any  crime,  even  for 
murder,  by  the  payment  of  a  fine,  the  amount  of  the  penalty  being 
determined  by  the  rank  of  the  victim.  Among  the  Saxons  the 
life  of  a  king's  thane  was  worth  1200  shillings,  while  that  of  a 
common  free  man  was  valued  only  one-sixth  as  high. 

Ordeals.  —  The  modes  by  which  guilt  or  innocence  was  ascer- 
tained show  in  how  rude  a  state  was  the  administration  of  justice 
among  the  barbarians.  One  very  common  method  of  proof  was 
by  what  were  called  ordeals,  in  which  the  question  was  submitted 
to  the  judgment  of  God.  Of  these  the  chief  were  the  ordeal  by 
fire,  the  ordeal  by  water,  and  the  ordeal  by  battle. 

The  ordeal  by  fire  consisted  in  taking  in  the  hand  a  red-hot  iron, 
or  in  walking  blindfolded  with  bare  feet  over  a  row  of  hot  plough- 
shares laid  lengthwise  at  irregular  distances.  If  the  person  escaped 
without  serious  harm,  he  was  held  to  be  innocent.  Another  way  of 
performing  the  fire  ordeal  was  by  running  through  the  flame  of 
two  fires  built  close  together,  or  by  walking  over  live  brands; 
hence  the  phrase  "  to  haul  over  the  coals." 

The  ordeal  by  water  was  of  two  kinds,  by  hot  water  and  cold. 
In  the  hot-water  ordeal  the  accused  person  thrust  his  arm  into 
boiling  water,  and  if  no  hurt  was  visible  upon  the  arm  three  days 
after  the  operation,  the  person  was  considered  guiltless.  When  we 
speak  of  one's  being  "  in  hot  water,"  we  use  an  expression  which 
had  its  origin  in  this  ordeal. 

In  the  cold-water  trial  the  suspected  person  was  thrown  into  a 
stream  or  pond :  if  he  floated,  he  was  held  guilty ;  if  he  sank, 
innocent.  The  water,  it  was  believed,  would  reject  the  guilty, 
but  receive  the  innocent  into  its  bosom.  The  practice  common 
in  Kurope  until  a  very  recent  date  of  trying  supposed  witches  by 
weighing  them,  or  by  throwing  them  into  a  pond  of  water  to  see 
whether  they  would  sink  or  float,  grew  out  of  this  superstition. 

The  trial  by  combat,  or  wager  of  battle,  was  a  solemn  judicial 
duel.  It  was  resorted  to  in  the  belief  that  God  would  give  victory 
to  the  right.  Naturally  it  was  a  favorite  mode  of  trial  among  a 
people  who  found  their  chief  delight  in  fighting.     Even  religious 


388  THE  LATIN  AND    TEUTONIC  PEOPLES. 

disputes  were  sometimes  settled  in  this  way.  The  modern  duel 
may  probably  be  regarded  as  a  relic  of  this  form  of  trial. 

The  ordeal  was  frequently  performed  by  deputy,  that  is,  one 
person  for  hire  or  for  the  sake  of  friendship  would  undertake  it 
for  another ;  hence  the  expression  "  to  go  through  fire  and  water 
to  serve  one."  Especially  was  such  substitution  common  in  the 
judicial  duel,  as  women  and  ecclesiastics  were  generally  forbidden 
to  appear  personally  in  the  lists.  The  champions,  as  the  deputies 
were  called,  became  in  time  a  regular  class  in  society,  like  the 
gladiators  in  ancient  Rome.  Religious  houses  and  chartered 
towns  hired  champions  at  a  regular  salary  to  defend  all  the  cases 
to  which  they  might  become  a  party. 

The  Revival  of  the  Roman  Law.  —  Now  the  barbarian  law- 
system,  if  such  it  can  be  called,  the  character  of  which  we  have 
simply  suggested  by  the  preceding  illustrations,  gradually  displaced 
the  Roman  law  in  all  those  countries  where  the  two  systems  at 
first  existed  alongside  each  other,  save  in  Italy  and  Southern 
France,  where  the  provincials  greatly  outnumbered  the  invaders. 
But  the  admirable  jurisprudence  of  Rome  was  bound  to  assert  its 
superiority.  About  the  close  of  the  eleventh  century,  there  was  a 
great  revival  in  the  study  of  the  Roman  law  as  embodied  in  the 
Corpus  Juris  Civilis  of  Justinian  (see  p.  358),  and  in  the  course 
of  a  century  or  two  this  became  either  the  groundwork  or  a  strong 
modifying  element  in  the  jurisprudence  of  almost  all  the  peoples 
of  Europe. 

What  took  place  may  be  illustrated  by  reference  to  the  fate  of 
the  Teutonic  languages  in  Gaul,  Italy,  and  Spain.  As  the  barba- 
rian tongues,  after  maintaining  a  place  in  those  countries  for  two 
or  three  centuries,  at  length  gave  place  to  the  superior  Latin, 
which  became  the  basis  of  the  new  Romance  languages,  so  now 
in  the  domain  of  law  the  barbarian  maxims  and  customs,  though 
holding  their  place  more  persistently,  likewise  finally  give  way, 
almost  everywhere  and  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  to  the  more 
excellent  law-system  of  the  empire.  Rome  must  fulfil  her  destiny 
and  give  laws  to  the  nations. 


THE  REIGN  OF  JUSTINIAN.  389 


CHAPTER    XXXV. 

THE   ROMAN  EMPIRE  IN  THE  EAST. 

The  Reign  of  Justinian  (a.d.  527-565).  —  During  the  fifty  years 
immediately  following  the  fall  of  Rome,  the  Eastern  emperors 
struggled  hard  and  doubtfully  to  withstand  the  waves  of  the  bar- 
barian inundation  which  constantly  threatened  to  overwhelm  Con- 
stantinople with  the  same  awful  calamities  that  had  befallen  the 
imperial  city  of  the  West.  Had  the  new  Rome — the  destined 
refuge  for  a  thousand  years  of  Graeco-Roman  learning  and  culture 
—  also  gone  down  at  this  time  before  the  storm,  the  loss  to  the 
cause  of  civilization  would  have  been  incalculable. 

Fortunately,  in  the  year  527,  there  ascended  the  Eastern  throne 
a  prince  of  unusual  ability,  to  whom  fortune  gave  a  general  of 
such  rare  genius  that  his  name  has  been  allotted  a  place  in  the 
short  list  of  the  great  commanders  of  the  world.  Justinian  was 
the  name  of  the  prince,  and  Belisarius  that  of  the  soldier.  The 
sovereign  has  given  name  to  the  period,  which  is  called  after  him 
the  "  Era  of  Justinian." 

It  will  be  recalled  that  it  was  during  this  reign  that  Africa  was 
recovered  from  the  Vandals  and  Italy  from  the  Goths  (see  p.  372). 
These  conquests  brought  once  more  within  the  boundaries  of  the 
empire  some  of  the  fairest  lands  of  the  West. 

But  that  which  has  given  Justinian's  reign  a  greater  distinction 
than  any  conferred  upon  it  by  brilliant  military  achievements,  is 
the  collection  and  publication,  under  the  imperial  direction,  of  the 
Corpus  Juris  Civilis,  or  "  Body  of  the  Roman  Law."  This  work 
is  the  most  precious  legacy  of  Rome  to  the  modern  world.  In 
causing  its  publication,  Justinian  earned  the  title  of  "  The  Law- 
giver of  Civilization  "  (see  p.  358). 

In  the  midst  of  this  brilliant  reign  an  awful   pestilence,  bred 


390  THE  ROMAN  EMPIRE  IN  THE  EAST. 

probably  in  Egypt,  fell  upon  the  empire,  and  did  not  cease  its 
ravages  until  about  fifty  years  afterwards.  This  plague  was  the 
most  terrible  scourge  of  which  history  has  any  knowledge,  save 
perhaps  the  so-called  Black  Death,  which  afflicted  Europe  in  the 
fourteenth  century.  The  number  of  victims  of  the  plague  has 
been  estimated  at  100,000,000. 

The  Reign  of  Heraclius  (a.d.  610-641).  —  For  half  a  century 
after  the  death  of  Justinian,  the  annals  of  the  Byzantine  empire 
are  unimportant.  Then  we  reach  the  reign  of  Heraclius,  a  prince 
about  whose  worthy  name  gather  matters  of  significance  in  world- 
history. 

About  this  time  Chosroes  II.,  king  of  Persia,  wrested  from  the 
empire  the  fortified  cities  that  guarded  the  Euphratean  frontier, 
and  overran  all  Syria,  Egypt,  and  Asia  Minor.  What  was  known 
as  the  True  Cross  was  torn  from  the  church  at  Jerusalem  and  car- 
ried off  in  triumph  to  Persia.  In  order  to  compel  Chosroes  to 
recall  his  armies,  which  were  distressing  the  provinces  of  the 
empire,  Heraclius,  pursuing  the  same  plan  as  that  by  which  the 
Romans  in  the  Second  Punic  War  forced  the  Carthaginians  to  call 
Hannibal  out  of  Italy  (see  p.  264),  with  a  small  company  of 
picked  men  marched  boldly  into  the  heart  of  Persia,  and  in 
revenge  for  the  insults  heaped  by  the  infidels  upon  the  Chris- 
tian churches,  overturned  the  altars  of  the  fire-worshippers  and 
quenched  their  sacred  flames. 

The  struggle  between  the  two  rival  empires  was  at  last  decided 
by  a  terrible  combat  known  as  the  Battle  of  Nineveh  (a.d.  627), 
which  was  fought  around  the  ruins  of  the  old  Assyrian  capital. 
The  Persian  army  was  almost  annihilated.  In  a  few  days  grief  or 
violence  ended  the  life  of  Chosroes.  With  him  passed  away  the 
glory  of  the  Second  Persian  Empire.  The  new  Persian  king 
negotiated  a  treaty  of  peace  with  Heraclius.  The  articles  of  this 
treaty  left  the  boundaries  of  the  two  empires  unchanged. 

The  Empire  becomes  Greek. — The  two  combatants  in  the 
fierce  struggle  which  we  have  been  watching,  were  too  much  ab- 
sorbed in  their  contentions  to  notice  the  approach  of  a  storm 


THE  EMPIRE  BECOMES   GREEK.  391 

from  the  deserts  of  Arabia,  —  a  storm  destined  to  overwhelm  both 
alike  in  its  destructive  course.  Within  a  few  years  from  the 
date  of  the  Battle  of  Nineveh,  the  Saracens  entered  upon  their 
surprising  career  of  conquest,  which  in  a  short  time  completely 
changed  the  face  of  the  entire  East,  and  set  the  Crescent,  the  em- 
blem of  a  new  faith,  alike  above  the  fire-altars  of  Persia  and  the 
churches  of  the  Empire.  Heraclius  himself  lived  to  see  —  so 
cruel  are  the  vicissitudes  of  fortune  —  the  very  provinces  which 
he  had  wrested  from  the  hands  of  the  fire-worshippers,  in  the 
hands  of  the  more  insolent  followers  of  the  False  Prophet,  and 
the  Crescent  planted  within  sight  of  the  walls  of  Constantinople. 

The  conquests  of  the  Saracens  cut  off  from  the  empire  those 
provinces  that  had  the  smallest  Greek  element  and  thus  rendered 
the  population  subject  to  the  emperor  more  homogeneous,  more 
thoroughly  Greek.  The  Roman  element  disappeared,  and  the 
court  of  Constantinople  became  Greek  in  tone,  spirit,  and  manners. 
Hence,  instead  of  longer  applying  to  the  empire  the  designation 
Roman,  we  shall  from  this  on  call  it  the  Greek,  or  Byzantine 
empire. 

We  shall  trace  no  further  as  a  separate  story  the  fortunes  of  the 
Eastern  emperors.  In  the  eighth  century  the  so-called  Icono- 
clastic controversy1  will  draw  our  attention  to  them;  and  then 
again  in  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  the  Crusades  will  once 
more  bring  their  affairs  into  prominence,  and  we  shall  see  a  line  of 
Latin  princes  seated  for  a  time  (from  1204  to  1261)  upon  the 
throne  of  Constantine.2  Finally,  in  the  year  1453,  we  shall  wit- 
ness the  capture  of  Constantinople  by  the  Turks,3  which  disaster 
closes  the  long  and  checkered  history  of  the  Graeco-Roman  em- 
pire in  the  East. 

1  See  p.  41 7.  2  See  p.  446.  *  See  p.  462. 


392 


MOHAMMED  AND    THE   SARACENS. 


CHAPTER    XXXVI. 


MOHAMMED  AND  THE  SARACENS. 


Introductory  Statement.  —  The  Arabs,  or  Saracens,  who  are 

now  about  to  play  their  surpris- 
ing part  in  history,  are,  after  the 
Hebrews,  the  most  important  peo- 
ple of  the  Semitic  race.  Secure 
in  their  inaccessible  deserts,  the 
Arabs  have  never  as  a  people 
bowed  their  necks  to  a  foreign 
conqueror,  although  portions  of 
the  Arabian  peninsula  have  been 
repeatedly  subjugated  by  different 
races. 

Religious  Condition  of  Arabia 
before  Mohammed.  —  Before  the 
reforms  of  Mohammed,  the  Arabs 
were  idolaters.  Their  holy  city 
was  Mecca.  Here  was  the  ancient 
and  most  revered  shrine  of  the 
Caaba,  where  was  preserved  a  sa- 
cred black  stone  believed  to  have 
been  given  by  an  angel  to  Abra- 
ham. 

But  though  the  native  tribes  of 
the  peninsula  were  idolaters,  still 
there  were  many  followers  of  other 
faiths  ;  for  Arabia  at  this  time  was 
a  land  of  religious  freedom.  The  altar  of  the  fire-worshipper 
rose  alongside  the  Jewish  synagogue   and   the  Christian  church. 


AN    ARAB    RIDER 


MOHAMMED. 


393 


The  Jews  especially  were  to  be  found  everywhere  in  great  numbers, 
having  been  driven  from  Palestine  by  the  Roman  persecutions.  It 
was  from  the  Jews  and  Christians,  doubtless,  that  Mohammed 
learned  many  of  the  doctrines  that  he  taught. 

Mohammed.  —  Mohammed,  the  great  prophet  of  the  Arabs, 
was  born  in  the  holy  city  of  Mecca,  about  the  year  5  70  of  our  era. 
He  sprang  from  the  distinguished  tribe  of  the  Koreishites,  the 
custodians  of  the  sacred  shrine  of  the  Caaba.  Like  Moses,  he 
spent  many  years  of  his  life  as  a  shepherd. 


MOSQUE    AND    CAABA    AT    MECCA.      (From  a  photograph.) 

Mohammed  possessed  a  deeply  religious  nature,  and  it  was  his 
wont  often  to  retire  to  a  cave  a  few  miles  from  Mecca,  and  there 
spend  long  vigils  in  prayer.  He  declared  that  here  he  had  visions, 
irr  which  the  angel  Gabriel  appeared  to  him,  and  made  to  him 
revelations  which  he  was  commanded  to  make  known  to  his 
fellow- men.  The  sum  of  the  new  faith  which  he  was  to  teach  was 
this :  "There  is  but  one  God,  and  Mohammed  is  his  Prophet." 

Mohammed  communicated  the  nature  of  his  visions  to  his  wife, 
and  she  became  his  first  convert.  At  the  end  of  three  years  his 
disciples  numbered  forty  persons. 

The   Hegira   (622). — The  teachings   of  Mohammed   at   last 


394  MOHAMMED  AND    THE   SARACENS. 

aroused  the  anger  of  a  powerful  party  among  the  Koreishites,  who 
feared  that  they,  as  the  guardians  of  the  national  idols  of  the 
Caaba,  would  be  compromised  in  the  eyes  of  the  other  tribes 
by  allowing  such  heresy  to  be  openly  taught  by  one  of  their  num- 
ber, and  accordingly  plots  were  formed  against  his  life.  Barely 
escaping  assassination,  he  fled  to  the  city  of  Medina. 

This  Hegira,  or  Flight,  as  the  word  signifies,  occurred  in  the 
year  622,  and  was  considered  by  the  Moslems  as  such  an  important 
event  in  the  history  of  their  religion  that  they  adopted  it  as  the 
beginning  of  a  new  era,  and  from  it  still  continue  to  reckon  their 
dates. 

The  Faith  extended  by  the  Sword.  —  His  cause  being  warmly 
espoused  by  the  inhabitants  of  Medina,  Mohammed  threw  aside 
the  character  of  an  exhorter,  and  assumed  that  of  a  warrior.  He 
declared  it  to  be  the  will  of  God  that  the  new  faith  should  be 
spread  by  the  sword.  Accordingly,  the  year  following  the  Hegira, 
he  began  to  attack  and  plunder  caravans.  The  flames  of  a  sacred 
war  were  soon  kindled.  The  reckless  enthusiasm  of  his  wild  con- 
verts was  intensified  by  the  assurance  of  the  Apostle  that  death 
met  in  fighting  those  who  resisted  the  true  faith  ensured  the  martyr 
immediate  entrance  upon  the  joys  of  Paradise.  Within  ten  years 
from  the  time  of  the  assumption  of  the  sword  by  Mohammed, 
Mecca  had  been  conquered,  and  the  new  creed  established  among 
all  the  tribes  of  Arabia. 

Mohammed  died  in  the  year  632.  No  character  in  all  history 
has  been  the  subject  of  more  conflicting  speculations  than  the 
Arabian  Prophet.  By  some  he  has  been  called  a  self-deluded 
enthusiast,  while  others  have  denounced  him  as  the  boldest  of 
impostors.  We  shall,  perhaps,  reconcile  these  discordant  views, 
if  we  bear  in  mind  that  the  same  person  may,  in  different  periods 
of  a  long  career,  be  both. 

The  Koran  and  the  Doctrines  of  Islam.  —  Before  going  on  to 
trace  the  conquests  of  the  successors  of  Mohammed,  we  must 
form  some  acquaintance  with  the  religion  of  the  great  Prophet. 

The   doctrines   of  Mohammedanism,  or   Islam,  which   means 


ABUBEKR.  395 

"  submission,"  are  contained  in  the  Koran,  the  sacred  book  of  the 
Moslems.  They  declare  that  God  has  revealed  himself  through 
four  holy  men  :  to  Moses  he  gave  the  Pentateuch ;  to  David,  the 
Psalms ;  to  Jesus,  the  Gospels ;  and  to  Mohammed,  the  last  and 
greatest  of  all  the  prophets,  he  gave  the  Koran. 

"  There  is  no  God  save  Allah,"  is  the  fundamental  doctrine  of 
Islamism,  and  to  this  is  added  the  equally  binding  declaration  that 
"Mohammed  is  the  Prophet  of  Allah."  The  faithful  Moslem 
must  also  believe  in  the  sacredness  and  infallibility  of  the  Koran. 
He  is  also  required  to  believe  in  the  resurrection  and  the  day  of 
judgment,  and  an  after-state  of  happiness  and  of  misery.  Also 
he  must  believe  in  the  absoluteness  of  the  decrees  of  God,  —  that 
he  foreordains  whatsoever  comes  to  pass,  and  that  nothing  man 
can  do  can  change  his  appointments. 

The  Koran,  while  requiring  assent  to  the  foregoing  creed,  incul- 
cates the  practice  of  four  virtues.  The  first  is  prayer ;  five  times 
each  day  must  the  believer  turn  his  face  towards  Mecca  and  engage 
in  devotion.  The  second  requirement  is  almsgiving.  The  third 
is  keeping  the  Fast  of  Ramadan,  which  lasts  a  whole  month.  The 
fourth  duty  is  making  a  pilgrimage  to  Mecca. 

Abubekr,  First  Successor  of  Mohammed  (632-634).  —  Upon 
the  death  of  Mohammed  a  dispute  at  once  arose  as  to  his  suc- 
cessor ;  for  the  Prophet  left  no  children,  nor  had  he  designated 
upon  whom  his  mantle  should  fall.  Abubekr,  the  Apostle's  father- 
in-law,  was  at  last  chosen  to  the  position,  with  the  title  of  Caliph, 
or  Vicar,  of  the  Prophet,  although  many  thought  that  the  place 
belonged  to  AH,  the  Prophet's  cousin  and  son-in-law,  and  one  of 
his  first  and  most  faithful  companions.  This  question  of  succes- 
sion was  destined  at  a  later  period  to  divide  the  Mohammedan 
world  into  two  sects,  animated  by  the  most  bitter  and  lasting  hos- 
tility towards  each  other.1 

During  the  first  part  of  his  caliphate,  Abubekr  was  engaged  in 

1  The  Mohammedans  of  Persia,  who  are  known  as  Shiites,  are  the  leaders 
of  the  party  of  Ali;  while  the  Turks,  known  as  Sunnites,  are  the  chief  ad- 
herents of  the  opposite  party. 


396  MOHAMMED  AND    THE  SARACENS. 

suppressing  revolts  in  different  parts  of  the  peninsula.  These 
commotions  quieted,  he  was  free  to  carry  out  the  last  injunction 
of  the  Prophet  to  his  followers,  which  enjoined  them  to  spread  his 
doctrines  by  the  sword,  till  all  men  had  confessed  the  creed  of 
Islam,  or  consented  to  pay  tribute  to  the  Faithful. 

The  Conquest  of  Syria.  —  The  country  which  Abubekr  resolved 
first  to  reduce  was  Syria.  A  call  addressed  to  all  the  Faithful 
throughout  Arabia  was  responded  to  with  the  greatest  alacrity  and 
enthusiasm.  From  every  quarter  the  warriors  flocked  to  Medina, 
until  the  desert  about  the  city  was  literally  covered  with  their  black 
tents,  and  crowded  with  men  and  horses  and  camels.  After 
invoking  the  blessing  of  God  upon  the  hosts,  Abubekr  sent  them 
forward  upon  their  holy  mission. 

Heraclius  made  a  brave  effort  to  defend  the  holy  places  against 
the  fanatical  warriors  of  the  desert,  but  all  in  vain.  His  armies 
were  cut  to  pieces.  Seeing  there  was  no  hope  of  saving  Jerusalem, 
he  removed  from  that  city  to  Constantinople  the  True  Cross,  which 
he  had  rescued  from  the  Persians  (see  p.  390).  "  Farewell,  Syria," 
were  his  words,  as  he  turned  from  the  consecrated  land  which  he 
saw  must  be  given  up  to  the  followers  of  the  False  Prophet. 

The  Conquest  of  Persia  (632-641).  — While  one  Saracen  army 
was  overrunning  Syria,  another  was  busy  with  the  subjugation  of 
Persia.  Enervated  as  this  country  was  through  luxury,  and  weak- 
ened by  her  long  wars  with  the  Eastern  emperors,  she  could  offer 
but  feeble  resistance  to  the  terrible  energy  of  the  Saracens. 

Soon  after  the  conquest  of  Persia,  the  Arabs  crossed  the  moun- 
tains that  wall  Persia  on  the  north,  and  spread  their  faith  among 
the  Turanian  tribes  of  Central  Asia.  Among  the  most  formidable 
of  the  clans  that  adopted  the  new  religion  were  the  Turks.  Their 
conversion  was  an  event  of  the  greatest  significance,  for  it  was 
their  swords  that  were  destined  to  uphold  and  to  spread  the  creed 
of  Mohammed  when  the  fiery  zeal  of  his  own  countrymen  should 
abate,  and  their  arms  lose  the  dreaded  power  which  religious  fanat- 
icism had  for  a  moment  imparted  to  them. 

The  Conquest  of  Egypt  (638). — The  reduction  of  Persia  was 


CONQUEST  OF  NORTHERN  AFRICA.  397 

not  yet  fully  accomplished,  when  the  Caliph  Omar,  the  successor 
of  Abubekr,  commissioned  Amrou,  the  chief  whose  valor  had  won 
many  of  the  cities  of  Palestine,  to  carry  the  standard  of  the 
Prophet  into  the  Valley  of  the  Nile.  Alexandria,  after  holding 
out  against  the  arms  of  the  Saracens  for  more  than  a  year,  was  at 
length  abandoned  to  the  enemy.  Amrou,  in  communicating  the 
intelligence  of  the  important  event  to  Omar,  wrote  him  also  about 
the  great  Alexandrian  Library,  and  asked  him  what  he  should  do 
with  the  books.  Omar  is  said  to  have  replied  :  "  If  these  books 
agree  with  the  Koran,  they  are  useless  ;  if  they  disagree,  they  are 
pernicious  :  in  either  case  they  ought  to  be  destroyed."  Accord- 
ingly the  books  were  distributed  among  the  four  thousand  baths 
of  the  capital,  and  served  to  feed  their  fires  for  six  months. 

The  Conquest  of  Northern  Africa  (643-689).  —  The  lieuten- 
ants of  the  Caliphs  were  obliged  to  do  much  and  fierce  fighting 
before  they  obtained  possession  of  the  oft-disputed  shores  of 
North  Africa.  They  had  to  contend  not  only  with  the  Graeco- 
Roman  Christians  of  the  coast,  but  to  battle  also  with  the  idolatrous 
Moors  of  the  interior.  Furthermore,  all  Europe  had  begun  to  feel 
alarm  at  the  threatening  advance  of  the  Saracens  ;  so  now  Roman 
soldiers  from  Constantinople,  and  Gothic  warriors  from  Italy  and 
Spain  hastened  across  the  Mediterranean  to  aid  in  the  protection 
of  Carthage,  and  to  help  arrest  the  alarming  progress  of  these 
wild  fanatics  of  the  desert. 

But  all  was  of  no  avail.  Destiny  had  allotted  to  the  followers 
of  the  Apostle  the  land  of  Hannibal  and  Augustine.  Carthage 
was  taken  and  razed  to  the  ground,  and  the  entire  coast  from  the 
Nile  to  the  Atlantic  was  forced  to  acknowledge  the  authority  of 
the  Caliphs.  By  this  conquest  all  the  countries  of  Northern 
Africa,  whose  history  for  a  thousand  years  had  been  intertwined 
with  that  of  the  opposite  shores  of  Europe,  and  which  at  one  time 
seemed  destined  to  share  in  the  career  of  freedom  and  progress 
opening  to  the  peoples  of  that  continent,  were  drawn  back  into 
the  fatalism,  the  despotism,  and  the  stagnation  of  the  East.  From 
being  an  extension  of  Europe,  they  became  once  more  an  exten- 
sion of  Asia. 


398  MOHAMMED  AND    THE  SARACENS. 

Attacks  upon  Constantinople.  —  Only  fifty  years  had  now  passed 
since  the  death  of  Mohammed,  but  during  this  short  time  his 
standard  had  been  carried  by  the  lieutenants  of  his  successors 
through  Asia  to  the  Hellespont  on  the  one  side,  and  across  Africa 
to  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar  on  the  other.  From  each  of  these  two 
points,  so  remote  from  each  other,  the  fanatic  warriors  of  the 
desert  were  casting  longing  glances  across  those  narrow  passages 
of  water  which  alone  separated  them  from  the  single  continent 
that  their  swift  coursers  had  not  yet  traversed,  or  whence  the  spoil 
of  the  unbelievers  had  not  yet  been  borne  to  the  feet  of  the  Vicar 
of  the  Prophet  of  God.  We  may  expect  to  see  the  Saracens  at 
one  or  both  of  these  points  attempt  the  invasion  of  Europe. 

The  first  attempt  was  made  in  the  East  (in  668),  where  the 
Arabs  endeavored  to  gain  control  of  the  Bosporus,  by  wresting 
Constantinople  from  the  hands  of  the  Eastern  emperors.  But  the 
capital  was  saved  through  the  use,  by  the  besieged,  of  a  certain 
bituminous  compound,  called  Greek  Fire.  In  716,  the  city  was 
again  besieged  by  a  powerful  Moslem  army ;  but  its  heroic  defence 
by  the  Emperor  Leo  III.  saved  the  capital  for  several  centuries 
longer  to  the  Christian  world. 

The  Conquest  of  Spain  (711).  — While  the  Moslems  were  thus 
being  repulsed  from  Europe  at  its  eastern  extremity,  the  gates  of 
the  continent  were  opened  to  them  by  treachery  at  the  western, 
and  they  gained  a  foothold  in  Spain.  At  the  great  battle  of 
Xeres  (711),  Roderic,  the  last  of  the  Visigothic  kings,  was  hope- 
lessly defeated,  and  all  the  peninsula,  save  some  mountainous 
regions  in  the  northwest,  quickly  submitted  to  the  invaders.  Thus 
some  of  the  fairest  provinces  of  Europe  were  lost  to  Christendom 
for  a  period  of  nearly  eight  hundred  years. 

No  sooner  had  the  subjugation  of  the  country  been  effected 
than  multitudes  of  colonists  from  Arabia,  Syria,  and  North  Africa 
crowded  into  the  peninsula,  until  in  a  short  time  the  provinces  of 
Seville,  Cordova,  Toledo,  and  Granada  became  Arabic  in  dress, 
manners,  language,  and  religion. 

Invasion  of  France:   Battle  of  Tours  (732).  —  Four  or  five 


INVASION  OF  FRANCE.  399 

years  after  the  conquest  of  Spain,  the  Saracens  crossed  the 
Pyrenees,  and  established  themselves  upon  the  plains  of  Gaul. 
This  advance  of  the  Moslem  hosts  beyond  the  northern  wall  of 
Spain  was  viewed  with  the  greatest  alarm  by  all  Christendom.  It 
looked  as  though  the  followers  of  Mohammed  would  soon  possess 
all  the  continent.  As  Draper  pictures  it,  the  Crescent,  lying  in  a 
vast  semi-circle  upon  the  northern  shore  of  Africa  and  the  curving 
coast  of  Asia,  with  one  horn  touching  the  Bosporus  and  the 
other  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  seemed  about  to  round  to  the  full 
and  overspread  all  Europe. 

In  the  year  732,  exactly  one  hundred  years  after  the  death  of 
the  great  Prophet,  the  Franks,  under  their  renowned  chieftain, 
Charles,  and  their  allies  met  the  Moslems  upon  the  plains  of  Tours 
in  the  centre  of  Gaul,  and  committed  to  the  issue  of  a  single  battle 
the  fate  of  Christendom  and  the  future  course  of  history.  The 
desperate  valor  displayed  by  the  warriors  of  both  armies  was 
worthy  of  the  prize  «at  stake.  Abderrahman,  the  Mohammedan 
leader,  fell  in  the  thick  of  the  fight,  and  night  saw  the  complete 
discomfiture  of  the  Moslem  hordes.  The  loss  that  the  sturdy 
blows  of  the  Germans  had  inflicted  upon  them  was  enormous,  the 
accounts  of  that  age  swelling  the  number  killed  to  the  impossible 
figures  of  375,000.  The  disaster  at  all  events  was  too  overwhelm- 
ing to  permit  the  Saracens  ever  to  recover  from  the  blow,  and 
they  soon  retreated  behind  the  Pyrenees. 

The  young  civilization  of  Europe  was  thus  delivered  from  an 
appalling  danger,  such  as  had  not  threatened  it  since  the  fearful 
days  of  Attila  and  the  Huns.  The  heroic  Duke  Charles  who  had 
led  the  warriors  of  Christendom  to  the  glorious  victory  was  given 
the  surname  Martel,  the  "  Hammer,"  in  commemoration  of  the 
mighty  blows  of  his  huge  battle-axe. 

Changes  in  the  Caliphate.  —  During  the  century  of  conquests 
we  have  traced,  there  were  many  changes  in  the  caliphate. 
Abubekr  was  followed  by  Omar  (634-644),  Othman  (644-655), 
and  Ali  (655-661),  all  of  whom  fell  by  the  hands  of  assassins,  for 
from  the  very  first  dissensions  were  rife  among  the  followers  of 


400  MOHAMMED  AND    THE   SARACENS. 

the  Prophet.  Ali  was  the  last  of  the  four  so-called  "Ortho- 
dox Caliphs,"  all  of  whom  were  relatives  or  companions  of  the 
Prophet. 

Moawiyah,  a  usurper,  was  now  recognized  as  Caliph  (661). 
He  succeeded  in  making  the  office  hereditary,  instead  of  elective, 
as  it  hitherto  had  been,  and  thus  established  what  is  known  as  the 
dynasty  of  the  Ommiades,1  the  rulers  of  which  family  for  nearly 
a  century  issued  their  commands  from  the  city  of  Damascus. 

The  house  of  the  Ommiades  was  overthrown  by  the  adherents 
of  the  house  of  Ali,  who  established  a  new  dynasty  (750),  known 
as  that  of  the  x\bbassides,  so  called  from  Abbas,  an  uncle  of 
Mohammed.  The  new  family,  soon  after  coming  to  power,  estab- 
lished the  seat  of  the  royal  residence  on  the  lower  Tigris,  and 
upon  the  banks  of  that  river  founded  the  renowned  city  of  Bag- 
dad, which  was  destined  to  remain  the  abode  of  the  Abbasside 
Caliphs  for  a  period  of  five  hundred  years,  —  until  the  subver- 
sion of  the  house  by  the  Tartars  of  the  North* 

The  golden  age  of  the  caliphate  of  Bagdad  covers  the  latter 
part  of  the  eighth  and  the  ninth  century  of  our  era,  and  was  illus- 
trated by  the  reign  of  the  renowned  Haroun-al-Raschid  (786- 
809),  the  hero  of  the  Arabian  Nights.  During  this  period  science, 
philosophy,  and  literature  were  most  assiduously  cultivated  by 
the  Arabian  scholars,  and  the  court  of  the  Caliphs  presented  in 
culture  and  luxury  a  striking  contrast  to  the  rude  and  barbarous 
courts  of  the  kings  and  princes  of  Western  Christendom. 

The  Dismemberment  of  the  Caliphate.  —  "At  the  close  of  the 
first  century  of  the  Hegira,"  writes  Gibbon,  "  the  Caliphs  were 
the  most  potent  and  absolute  monarchs  of  the  globe.  The  word 
that  went  forth  from  the  palace  at  Damascus  was  obeyed  on  the 
Indus,  on  the  Jaxartes,  and  on  the  Tagus."  Scarcely  less  potent 
was  the  word  that  at  first  went  forth  from  Bagdad.  But  in  a  short 
time  the  extended  empire  of  the  Abbassides,  through  the  quarrels 
of  sectaries  and  the  ambitions  of  rival  aspirants  for  the  honors  of 
the  caliphate,  was  broken  in  fragments,  and  from  three  capitals  — 

1  So  called  from  Ommaya,  an  ancestor  of  Moawiyah. 


SPREAD   OF  MOHAMMEDANISM.  401 

Bagdad  upon  the  Tigris,  Cairo  upon  the  Nile,  and  Cordova 
upon  the  Guadalquivir  —  were  issued  the  commands  of  three 
rival  Caliphs,  each  of  whom  was  regarded  by  his  adherents  as 
the  sole  rightful  spiritual  and  civil  successor  of  the  Apostle. 
All,  however,  held  the  great  Arabian  Prophet  in  the  same  rev- 
erence, all  maintained  with  equal  zeal  the  sacred  character  of 
the  Koran,  and  all  prayed  with  their  faces  turned  toward  the  holy 
city  of  Mecca. 

Spread  of  the  Religion  and  Language  of  the  Arabs. — Just 
as  the  Romans  Romanized  the  peoples  they  conquered,  so  did 
the  Saracens  Saracenize  the  populations  of  the  countries  subjected 
to  their  authority.  Over  a  large  part  of  Spain,  over  North  Africa, 
Egypt,  Syria,  Babylonia,  Persia,  Northern  India,  and  portions  of 
Central  Asia,  were  spread  —  to  the  more  or  less  perfect  exclusion 
of  native  customs,  speech,  and  worship  —  the  manners,  the  lan- 
guage, and  the  religion  of  the  Arabian  conquerors.1 

In  Arabia  no  religion  was  tolerated  save  the  faith  of  the  Koran. 
But  in  all  the  countries  beyond  the  limits  of  the  peninsula,  freedom 
of  worship  was  allowed  (save  to  idolaters,  who  were  to  be  "  rooted 
out");  unbelievers,  however,  must  purchase  this  liberty  by  the 
payment  of  a  moderate  tribute.  Yet  notwithstanding  this  tolera- 
tion, the  Christian  and  Zoroastrian  religions  gradually  died  out 
almost  everywhere  throughout  the  domains  of  the  Caliphs.2 

The  Defects  of  Islam.  —  Civilization  certainly  owes  a  large  debt 
to  the  Saracens.  They  preserved  and  transmitted  much  that  was 
valuable  in  the  science  of  the  Greeks  and  the  Persians  (see  p.  472). 
They  improved  trigonometry  and  algebra,  and   from   India  they 

1  Beyond  the  eastern  edge  of  Mesopotamia,  the  Arabs  failed  to  impress 
their  language  upon  the  subjected  peoples,  or  in  any  way,  save  in  the  matter 
of  creed,  to  leave  upon  them  any  important  permanent  trace  of  their  con- 
quests. 

■  The  number  of  Guebers,  or  fire-worshippers,  in  Persia  at  the  present  time 
is  estimated  at  from  50,000  to  100,000.  About  the  same  number  may  be 
counted  in  India,  the  descendants  of  the  Guebers  who  fled  from  Persia  at  the 
time  of  the  Arabian  invasion.  They  are  there  called  Parsees,  from  the  land 
whence  they  came. 


402  MOHAMMED  AND    THE   SARACENS. 

borrowed  the  decimal  system  of  notation  and  introduced  it  into 
the  West. 

Many  of  the  doctrines  of  Islam,  however,  are  most  unfavor- 
able to  human  liberty,  progress,  and  improvement.  It  teaches 
fatalism,  and  thus  discourages  effort  and  enterprise.  It  allows 
polygamy  and  puts  no  restraint  upon  divorce,  and  thus  destroys 
the  sanctity  of  the  family  life.  It  permits  slavery  and  fosters 
despotism.  It  inspires  a  blind  and  bigoted  hatred  of  race  and 
creed,  and  thus  puts  far  out  of  sight  the  salutary  truth  of  the 
brotherhood  of  man.  Because  of  these  and  other  scarcely  less 
prominent  defects  in  its  teachings,  Islam  has  proved  a  blight  and 
curse  to  almost  every  race  embracing  its  sterile  doctrines. 

Mohammedism  is  vastly  superior,  however,  either  to  fetichism 
or  idolatry,  and  consequently,  upon  peoples  very  low  in  the  scale 
of  civilization,  it  has  an  elevating  influence.  Thus,  upon  the  negro 
tribes  of  Central  Africa,  where  it  is  to-day  spreading  rapidly,  it  is 
acknowledged  to  have  a  civilizing  effect. 


GENERAL  REMARKS.  403 


CHAPTER    XXXVII. 

CHARLEMAGNE  AND  THE  RESTORATION  OF  THE  EMPIRE  IN 
THE  WEST. 

General  Remarks.  —  In  the  foregoing  chapter  we  traced  the 
rise  and  decline  of  the  power  of  the  Saracens.  We  saw  the 
Semitic  East  roused  for  a  moment  to  a  life  of  tremendous  energy 
by  the  miracle  of  religious  enthusiasm,  and  then  beheld  it  sinking 
rapidly  again  into  inaction  and  weakness,  disappointing  all  its  early 
promises.  Manifestly  the  "  Law  "  is  not  to  go  forth  from  Mecca. 
The  Semitic  race  is  not  to  lead  the  civilization  of  the  world. 

But  returning  again  to  the  West,  we  discover  among  the  Teutonic 
barbarians  indications  of  such  youthful  energy  and  life,  that  we 
are  at  once  persuaded  that  to  them  has  been  given  the  future. 
The  Franks,  who,  with  the  aid  of  their  confederates,  withstood 
the  advance  of  the  Saracens  upon  the  field  of  Tours,  and  saved 
Europe  from  subjection  to  the  Koran,  are  the  people  that  first 
attract  our  attention.  It  is  among  them  that  a  man  appears  who 
makes  the  first  grand  attempt  to  restore  the  laws,  the  order,  the 
institutions  of  the  ancient  Romans.  Charlemagne,  their  king,  is 
the  imposing  figure  that  moves  amidst  all  the  events  of  the  times ; 
indeed,  is  the  one  who  makes  the  events,  and  renders  the  period 
in  which  he  lived  an  epoch  in  universal  history.  The  story  of  this 
era  affords  the  key  to  very  much  of  the  subsequent  history  of 
Europe. 

How  Duke  Pepin  became  King  of  the  Franks.  — Charles  Mar- 
tel,  whose  tremendous  blows  at  Tours  earned  for  him  his  significant 
surname  (see  p.  399),  although  the  real  head  of  the  Frankish 
nation,  was  nominally  only  an  officer  of  the  Merovingian  court. 
He  died  without  ever  having  borne  the  title  of  king,  notwithstand- 
ing he  had  exercised  all  the  authority  of  that  office. 


404.  RESTORATION  OF   THE  EMPIRE   IN   THE     WEST. 

But  Charles's  son  Pepin,  called  le  Bref  (the  Short),  on  account 
of  his  diminutive  stature,  aspired  to  the  regal  title  and  honors. 
He  resolved  to  depose  his  titular  master,  and  to  make  himself 
king.  Not  deeming  it  wise,  however,  to  do  this  without  the 
sanction  of  the  Pope,  he  sent  an  embassy  to  represent  to  him  the 
state  of  affairs,  and  to  solicit  his  advice.  Mindful  of  recent  favors 
that  he  had  received  at  the  hands  of  Pepin,  the  Pope  gave  his 
approval  to  the  proposed  scheme  by  replying  that  it  seemed  alto- 
gether reasonable  that  the  one  who  was  king  in  power  should  be 
king  also  in  name.  This  was  sufficient.  Chilperic  —  such  was 
the  name  of  the  Merovingian  king  —  was  straightway  deposed, 
and  placed  in  a  monastery  j  while  Pepin,  whose  own  deeds  to- 
gether with  those  of  his  illustrious  father  had  done  so  much  for 
the  Frankish  nation  and  for  Christendom,  was  anointed  and 
crowned  king  of  the  Franks  (752),  and  thus  became  the  first  of 
the  Carolingian  line,  the  name  of  his  illustrious  son  Charlemagne 
giving  name  to  the  house. 

Beginning  of  the  Temporal  Power  of  the  Popes.  — In  the  year 
754  Pope  Stephen  II.,  who  was  troubled  by  the  Lombards  (see  p. 
374),  besought  Pepin's  aid.  Quick  to  return  the  favor  which  the 
head  of  the  Church  had  rendered  him  in  the  establishment  of  his 
power  as  king,  Pepin  straightway  crossed  the  Alps  with  a  large 
army,  expelled  the  Lombards  from  their  recent  conquests,  and 
made  a  donation  to  the  Pope  of  these  captured  cities  and  provinces 

(755)- 

This  famous  gift  may  be  regarded  as  having  laid  the  basis  of  the 
temporal  power  of  the  Popes ;  for  though  Pepin  probably  did  not 
intend  to  convey  to  the  Papal  See  the  absolute  sovereignty  of  the 
transferred  lands,  after  a  time  the  Popes  claimed  this,  and  finally 
came  to  exercise  within  the  limits  of  the  donated  territory  all  the 
rights  and  powers  of  independent  temporal  rulers.  So  here  we 
have  the  beginning  of  the  celebrated  Papal  States,  and  of  the 
story  of  the  Popes  as  temporal  princes. 

Accession  of  Charlemagne.  —  Pepin  died  in  the  year  768, 
and  his  kingdom  passed  into  the  hands  of  his  two  sons,  Carlo- 


CHARLEMAGNE'S   CAMPAIGNS. 


405 


man  and  Charles ;  but  within  three  years  the  death  of  Carloman 
and  the  free  votes  of  the  Franks  conferred  the  entire  kingdom 
upon  Charles,  better  known  as  Charlemagne,  or  "  Charles  the 
Great." 

His  Campaigns.  —  Charlemagne's  long  reign  of  nearly  half  a 
century  —  he  ruled  forty-six  years  —  was  filled  with  military  expe- 
ditions and  conquests,  by  which  he  so  extended  the  boundaries  of 
his  dominions,  that  at  his  death  they  embraced  the  larger  part 
of  Western  Europe.  He  made  fifty-two  military  campaigns,  the 
chief  of  which  were  against  the  Lombards,  the  Saracens,  and 
the  Saxons.  Of  these  we  will  speak 
briefly. 

Among  Charlemagne's  first  under- 
takings was  a  campaign  against  the 
Lombards,  whose  king,  Desiderius, 
was  troubling  the  Pope.  Charle- 
magne wrested  from  Desiderius  all 
his  possessions,  shut  up  the  unfortu- 
nate king  in  a  monastery,  and  placed 
on  his  own  head  the  iron  crown  of 
the  Lombards.  While  in  Italy  he 
visited  Rome,  and,  in  return  for  the 
favor  of  the  Pope,  confirmed  the  do- 
nation qf  his  father,  Pepin  (774). 

In  the  ninth  year  of  his  reign  Charlemagne  gathered  his  warriors 
for  a  crusade  against  the  Saracens  in  Spain.  He  crossed  the 
Pyrenees,  and  succeeded  in  wresting  from  the  Moslems  all  the 
northeastern  corner  of  the  peninsula.  As  he  was  leading  his  vic- 
torious bands  back  across  the  Pyrenees,  the  rear  of  his  army 
under  the  lead  of  the  renowned  paladin  Roland,  while  hemmed  in 
by  the  walls  of  the  Pass  of  Roncesvalles,  was  set  upon  by  the 
wild  mountaineers  (the  Gascons  and  Basques),  and  cut  to  pieces 
before  Charlemagne  could  give  relief.  Of  the  details  of  this 
event  no  authentic  account  has  been  preserved ;  but  long  after- 
wards it  formed  the  favorite  theme  of  the  tales  and  songs  of  the 
Troubadours  of  Southern  France. 


CHARLEMAGNE. 
(Head  of  a  bronze  equestrian  statuette.) 


406      RESTORATION  OF  THE  EMPIRE  IN  THE    WEST. 

But  by  far  the  greater  number  of  the  campaigns  of  Charlemagne 
were  directed  against  the  pagan  Saxons,  who  almost  alone  of  the 
German  tribes  still  retained  their  ancient  idolatry.  Thirty  years 
and  more  of  his  reign  were  occupied  in  these  wars  across  the 
Rhine.  Reduced  to  submission  again  and  again,  as  often  did  the 
Saxons  rise  in  desperate  revolt.  The  heroic  Witikind  was  the 
"second  Arminius  "  (see  p.  308)  who  encouraged  his  countrymen 
to  resist  to  the  last  the  intruders  upon  their  soil.  Finally,  Charle- 
magne, angered  beyond  measure  by  the  obstinacy  of  the  barbarians, 
caused  4500  prisoners  in  his  hands  to  be  massacred  in  revenge  for 
the  contumacy  of  the  nation.  The  Saxons  at  length  yielded,  and 
accepted  Charlemagne  as  their  sovereign,  and  Christianity  as  their 
religion. 

Restoration  of  the  Empire  in  the  West  (800).  —  An  event  of 
seemingly  little  real  moment,  yet,  in  its  influence  upon  succeeding 
affairs,  of  the  very  greatest  importance,  now  claims  our  attention. 
Pope  Leo  III.  having  called  upon  Charlemagne  for  aid  against  a 
hostile  faction  at  Rome,  the  king  soon  appeared  in  person  at  the 
capital,  and  punished  summarily  the  disturbers  of  the  peace  of 
the  Church.  The  gratitude  of  Leo  led  him  at  this  time  to  make 
a  most  signal  return  for  the  many  services  of  the  Frankish  king. 
To  understand  his  act  a  word  of  explanation  is  needed. 

For  a  considerable  time  a  variety  of  circumstances  had  been 
fostering  a  growing  feeling  of  enmity  between  the  Italiansiand  the 
emperors  at  Constantinople.  Disputes  had  arisen  between  the 
churches  of  the  East  and  those  of  the  West,  and  the  Byzantine 
rulers  had  endeavored  to  compel  the  Italian  churches  to  intro- 
duce certain  changes  and  reforms  in  their  worship,  which  had 
aroused  the  most  determined  opposition  of  the  Roman  bishops, 
who  denounced  the  Eastern  emperors  as  schismatics  and  heretics. 
Furthermore,  while  persecuting  the  orthodox  churches  of  the  West, 
these  unworthy  emperors  had  allowed  the  Christian  lands  of  the 
East  to  fall  a  prey  to  the  Arabian  infidels. 

Just  at  this  time,  moreover,  by  the  crime  of  the  Empress  Irene, 
who  had  deposed  her  son  Constantine  VI.,  and  put  out  his  eyes, 


THE  EMPEROR    OF  THE  ROMANS.  407 

that  she  might  have  his  place,  the  Byzantine  throne  was  vacant,  in 
the  estimation  of  the  Italians,  who  contended  that  the  crown  of 
the  Caesars  could  not  be  worn  by  a  woman.  Confessedly  it  was 
time  that  the  Pope  should  exercise  the  power  reposing  in  him  as 
Head  of  the  Church,  and  take  away  from  the  heretical  and  effemi- 
nate Greeks  the  Imperial  crown,  and  bestow  it  upon  some  strong, 
orthodox,  and  worthy  prince  in  the  West. 

Now,  among  all  the  Teutonic  chiefs  of  Western  Christendom, 
there  was  none  who  could  dispute  the  claims  to  the  honor  with  the 
king  of  the  Franks,  the  representative  of  a  most  illustrious  house, 
and  the  strongest  champion  of  the  young  Christianity  of  the  West 
against  her  pagan  foes.  Accordingly,  as  Charlemagne  was  partic- 
ipating in  the  festivities  of  Christmas  Day  in  the  Cathedral  of  St. 
Peter  at  Rome,  the  Pope  approached  the  kneeling  king,  —  who 
declared  afterwards  that  he  was  wholly  ignorant  of  the  designs  of 
his  friend,  —  and  placing  a  crown  of  gold  upon  his  head,  pro- 
claimed him  emperor  of  the  Romans,  and  the  rightful  and  con- 
secrated successor  of  Caesar  Augustus  and  Constantine  (800). 

The  intention  of  Pope  Leo  was,  by  a  sort  of  reversal  of  the  act 
of  Constantine,  to  bring  back  from  the  East  the  seat  of  the  Im- 
perial court ;  but  what  he  really  accomplished  was  a  restoration  of 
the  line  of  emperors  in  the  West,  which  324  years  before  had 
been  ended  by  Odoacer,  when  he  dethroned  Romulus  Augustus 
and  sent  the  royal  vestments  to  Constantinople  (see  p.  348).  We 
say  this  was  what  he  actually  effected  ;  for  the  Greeks  of  the  East, 
disregarding  wholly  what  the  Roman  people  and  the  Pope  had 
done,  maintained  their  line  of  emperors  just  as  though  nothing 
had  occurred  in  Italy.  So  now  from  this  time  on  for  centuries 
there  were  two  emperors,  one  in  the  East,  and  another  in  the 
West,  each  claiming  to  be  the  rightful  successor  of  Caesar 
Augustus.1 

1  From  this  time  on  it  will  be  proper  for  us  to  use  the  terms  Western 
Empire  and  Eastern  Kmpire.  These  names  should  not,  however,  be  em- 
ployed before  this  time,  for  the  two  parts  of  the  old  Roman  Empire  were 
simply  administrative  divisions  of  a  single  empire;   we  may  though,  properly 


408        RESTORATION  OF  THE  EMPIRE  IN   THE    WEST. 

Charlemagne's  Death ;  his  Work.  —  Charlemagne  enjoyed  the 
Imperial  dignity  only  fourteen  years,  dying  in  814.  Within  the 
cathedral  at  Aachen,  in  a  tomb  which  he  himself  had  built,  the 
dead  monarch  was  placed  upon  a  throne,  with  his  royal  robes 
around  him,  his  good  sword  by  his  side,  and  the  Bible  open  on 
his  lap.  It  seemed  as  though  men  could  not  believe  that  his 
reign  was  over ;  and  it  was  not. 

By  the  almost  universal  verdict  of  students  of  the  mediaeval 
period,  Charles  the  Great  has  been  pronounced  the  most  imposing 
personage  that  appears  between  the  fall  of  Rome  and  the  fif- 
teenth century.  His  greatness  has  erected  an  enduring  monument 
for  itself  in  his  name,  the  one  by  which  he  is  best  known  — 
Charlemagne. 

Charlemagne  must  not  be  regarded  as  a  warrior  merely.  His 
most  noteworthy  work  was  that  which  he  effected  as  a  reformer 
and  statesman.  He  founded  schools,  reformed  the  laws,  collected 
libraries,  and  extended  to  the  Church  a  patronage  worthy  of  a  Con- 
stantine.  In  a  word,  he  laid  "  the  foundation  of  all  that  is  noble 
and  beautiful  and  useful  in  the  history  of  the  Middle  Ages." 

Division  of  the  Empire ;  Treaty  of  Verdun  (843) .  —  Like  the 
kingdom  of  Alexander,  the  mighty  empire  of  Charlemagne  fell  to 
pieces  soon  after  his  death.  "  His  sceptre  was  the  bow  of  Ulysses 
which  could  not  be  drawn  by  any  weaker  hand."  After  a  troub- 
lous period  of  dissension  and  war,  the  empire  was  divided,  by  the 
important  Treaty  of  Verdun,  among  Charlemagne's  three  grand- 
children, —  Charles,  Lewis,  and  Lothair.  To  Charles  was  given 
France ;  to  Lewis,  Germany ;  and  to  Lothair,  Italy  and  the  valley 
of  the  Rhone,  together  with  a  narrow  strip  of  land  extending  from 
Switzerland  to  the  mouth  of  the  Rhine.  With  these  possessions 
of  Lothair  went  also  the  Imperial  title. 

enough,  speak  of  the  Roman  empire  in  the  West,  and  the  Roman  empire  in 
the  East,  or  of  the  Western  and  Eastern  emperors.  See  Bryce's  Holy  Roman 
Empire.  The  Eastern  Empire  was  destroyed  by  the  Turks  in  1453;  the  line 
of  Western  Teutonic  emperors  was  maintained  until  the  present  century,  when 
it  was  ended  by  the  act  of  Napoleon  in  the  dismemberment  of  Germany  (1806). 


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46 

CONCLUSION.  409 

This  treaty  is  celebrated,  not  only  because  it  was  the  first  great 
treaty  among  the  European  states,  but  also  on  account  of  its 
marking  the  divergence  from  one  another,  and  in  some  sense 
the  origin,  of  three  of  the  great  nations  of  modern  Europe,  — 
of  France,  Germany,  and  Italy. 

Conclusion. —  After  this  dismemberment  of  the  dominions  of 
Charlemagne,  the  annals  of  the  different  branches  of  the  Caro- 
lingian  family  become  intricate,  wearisome,  and  uninstructive.  A 
fate  as  dark  and  woeful  as  that  which,  according  to  Grecian  story, 
overhung  the  royal  house  of  Thebes,  seemed  to  brood  over  the 
house  of  Charlemagne.  In  all  its  different  lines  a  strange  and 
adverse  destiny  awaited  the  lineage  of  the  great  king.  The  tenth 
century  witnessed  the  extinction  of  the  family. 


410  THE   NORTHMEN. 


CHAPTER    XXXVIII. 
THE  NORTHMEN. 

The  People.  —  Northmen,  Norsemen,  Scandinavians,  are  differ- 
ent names  applied  in  a  general  way  to  the  early  inhabitants  of 
Denmark,  Norway,  and  Sweden.  These  people  formed  the  north- 
ern branch  of  the  Teutonic  family.  We  cannot  be  certain  when 
they  took  possession  of  the  northern  peninsulas,  but  it  is  probable 
that  they  had  entered  those  countries  long  before  Caesar  invaded 
Gaul. 

The  Northmen  as  Pirates  and  Colonizers.  —  For  the  first  eight 
centuries  of  our  era  the  Norsemen  are  hidden  from  our  view  in 
their  remote  northern  home ;  but  with  the  opening  of  the  ninth 
century  their  black  piratical  crafts  are  to  be  seen  creeping  along 
all  the  coasts  of  Germany,  Gaul,  and  the  British  Isles,  and  even 
venturing  far  up  their  inlets  and  creeks.  Every  summer  these 
dreaded  sea-rovers  made  swift  descents  upon  the  exposed  shores 
of  these  countries,  plundering,  burning,  murdering;  then  upon 
the  approach  of  the  stormy  season,  they  returned  to  winter  in  the 
sheltered  fiords  of  the  Scandinavian  peninsula.  After  a  time  the 
bold  corsairs  began  to  winter  in  the  lands  they  had  harried  during 
the  summer ;  and  soon  all  the  shores  of  the  countries  visited  were 
dotted  with  their  stations  or  settlements. 

These  marauding  expeditions  and  colonizing  enterprises  of  the 
Northmen  did  not  cease  until  the  eleventh  century  was  far  ad- 
vanced. The  consequences  ol  this  wonderful  outpouring  of  the 
Scandinavian  peoples  were  so  important  and  lasting  that  the  move- 
ment has  well  been  compared  to  the  great  migration  of  their  Ger- 
man kinsmen  in  the  fifth  and  sixth  centuries.  Europe  is  a  second 
time  inundated  by  the  Teutonic  barbarians. 

The  most  noteworthy  characteristic  of  these  Northmen  was  the 


ICELAND  AND   GREENLAND.  411 

readiness  with  which  they  laid  aside  their  own  manners,  habits, 
ideas,  and  institutions,  and  adopted  those  of  the  country  in  which 
they  established  themselves.  "  In  Russia  they  became  Russians  ; 
in  France,  Frenchmen ;  in  England,  Englishmen." 

Colonization  of  Iceland  and  Greenland.  —  Iceland  was  settled 
by  the  Northmen  in  the  ninth  century,1  and  about  a  century  later 
Greenland  was  discovered  and  colonized.  In  1874  the  Icelanders 
celebrated  the  thousandth  anniversary  of  the  settlement  of  their 
island,  an  event  very  like  our  Centennial  of  1876. 

America  was  reached  by  the  Northmen  as  early  as  the  begin- 
ning of  the  eleventh  century  :  the  Vineland  of  their  traditions  was 
possibly  some  part  of  the  New  England  coast.  It  is  believed 
that  these  first  visitors  to  the  continent  made  settlements  in  this 
new  land  ;  but  no  certain  remains  of  these  exist. 

The  Norsemen  in  Russia.  —  While  the  Norwegians  were  sailing 
boldly  out  into  the  Atlantic  and  taking  possession  of  the  isles  and 
coasts  of  the  western  seas,  the  Swedes  were  pushing  their  crafts 
across  the  Baltic  and  troubling  the  Slavonian  tribes  that  dwelt 
upon  the  eastern  shore  of  that  sea.  Either  by  right  of  conquest 
or  through  the  invitation  of  the  contentious  Slavonian  clans,  the 
renowned  Scandinavian  chieftain  Ruric  acquired,  in  the  year  862, 
kingly  dignity,  and  became  the  founder  of  the  first  royal  line  of 
Russia,  the  successive  kings  of  which  family  gradually  consolidated 
the  monarchy  which  was  destined  to  become  one  of  the  foremost 
powers  of  Europe. 

The  Danish  Conquest  of  England.  —  The  Danes  began  to  make 
descents  upon  the  English  coast  about  the  beginning  of  the  ninth 

1  Iceland  became  the  literary  centre  of  the  Scandinavian  world.  There 
grew  up  here  a  class  of  scalds,  or  bards,  who,  before  the  introduction  of  writ- 
ing, preserved  and  transmitted  orally  the  sagas,  or  legends,  of  the  Northern 
races.  About  the  twelfth  century  these  poems  and  legends  were  gathered 
into  collections  known  as  the  Elder,  or  poetic,  Edda,  and  the  Younger,  or 
prose,  Edda.  These  are  among  the  most  interesting  and  important  of  the 
literary  memorials  that  we  possess  of  the  early  Teutonic  peoples.  They  reflect 
faithfully  the  beliefs,  manners,  and  customs  of  the  Norsemen,  and  the  wild, 
adventurous  spirit  of  their  Sca-Kings. 


412  THE  NORTHMEN. 

century.  These  sea-rovers  spread  the  greatest  terror  through  the 
island ;  for  they  were  not  content  with  plunder,  but  being  pagans, 
they  took  special  delight  in  burning  the  churches  and  monasteries 
of  the  now  Christian  Anglo-Saxons,  or  English,  as  we  shall  here- 
after call  them.  After  a  time  the  Danes  began  to  make  perma- 
nent settlements  in  the  land.  The  wretched  English  were  subjected 
to  exactly  the  same  treatment  that  they  had  inflicted  upon  the 
Celts.  Much  need  had  they  to  pray  the  petition  of  the  Litany  of 
those  days,  —  "  From  the  fury  of  the  Northmen,  Good  Lord,  de- 
liver us."  Just  when  it  began  to  look  as  though  they  would  be 
entirely  annihilated  or  driven  from  the  island  by  the  barbarous 
intruders,  the  illustrious  Alfred  (871-901)  came  to  the  throne  of 
Wessex. 

For  six  years  the  youthful  king  fought  heroically  at  the  head  of 
his  brave  thanes  ;  but  each  succeeding  year  the  possessions  of  the 
English  grew  smaller,  and  finally  Alfred  and  his  few  remaining  fol- 
lowers were  driven  to  take  refuge  in  the  woods  and  morasses. 
After  a  time,  however,  the  affairs  of  the  English  began  to  brighten. 
The  Danes  were  overpowered,  and  though  allowed  to  hold  the 
northeastern  half  of  the  land,  still  they  were  forced  nominally  to 
acknowledge  the  authority  of  the  English  king. 

For  a  full  century  following  the  death  of  Alfred,  his  successors 
were  engaged  in  a  constant  struggle  to  hold  in  subjection  the 
Danes  already  settled  in  the  land,  or  to  protect  their  domains  from 
the  plundering  inroads  of  fresh  bands  of  pirates  from  the  northern 
peninsulas.  In  the  end,  the  Danes  got  the  mastery,  and  Canute, 
king  of  Denmark,  became  king  of  England  (1016).  For  eighteen 
years  he  reigned  in  a  wise  and  parental  way. 

Altogether  the  Danes  ruled  in  England  about  a  quarter  of  a  cen- 
tury (from  1016  to  1042),  and  then  the  old  English  line  was 
restored  in  the  person  of  Edward  the  Confessor. 

The  great  benefit  which  resulted  to  England  from  the  Danish 
conquest,  was  the  infusion  of  fresh  blood  into  the  veins  of  the 
English  people,  who  through  contact  with  the  half- Romanized 
Celts,  and  especially  through  the  enervating  influence  of  a  mo- 


SETTLEAfENT  IN  GAUL.  413 

nastic  church,  had  lost  much  of  that  bold,  masculine  vigor  which 
characterized  their  hardy  ancestors. 

Settlement  of  the  Northmen  in  Gaul.  —  The  Northmen  began 
to  make  piratical  descents  upon  the  coasts  of  Gaul  before  the  end 
of  the  reign  of  Charlemagne.  Tradition  tells  how  the  great  king, 
catching  sight  one  day  of  some  ships  of  the  Northmen,  burst  into 
tears  as  he  reflected  on  the  sufferings  that  he  foresaw  the  new  foe 
would  entail  upon  his  country. 

The  record  of  the  raids  of  the  Northmen  in  Gaul,  and  of  their 
final  settlement  in  the  north  of  the  country,  is  simply  a  repetition  of 
the  tale  of  the  Danish  forays  and  settlement  in  England.  At  last, 
in  the  year  918,  Charles  the  Simple  did  exactly  what  Alfred  the 
Great  had  done  across  the  Channel  only  a  very  short  time  before. 
He  granted  the  adventurous  Rollo,  the  leader  of  the  Northmen 
that  had  settled  at  Rouen,  a  considerable  section  of  country  in 
the  north-west  of  Gaul,  upon  condition  of  homage  and  conversion. 

In  a  short  time  the  barbarians  had  adopted  the  language,  the 
manners,  and  the  religion  of  the  French,  and  had  caught  much  of 
their  vivacity  and  impulsiveness  of  spirit,  without,  however,  any 
loss  of  their  own  native  virtues.  This  transformation  in  their 
manners  and  life  we  may  conceive  as  being  recorded  in  their 
transformed  name  —  Northmen  becoming  softened  into  Norman. 
As  has  been  said,  they  were  simply  changed  from  heathen  Vikings, 
delighting  in  the  wild  life  of  sea-rover  and  pirate,  into  Christian 
knights,  eager  for  pilgrimages  and  crusades. 


414  RISE    OF   THE  PAPAL   POWER. 


CHAPTER    XXXIX. 

n 

RISE  OF  THE   PAPAL   POWER. 

Introduction.  —  In  an  early  chapter  of  our  book  we  told  how 
Christianity  as  a  system  of  beliefs  and  precepts  took  possession  of 
the  different  nations  and  tribes  of  Europe.  We  purpose  in  the 
present  chapter  to  tell  how  the  Christian  Church  grew  into  a  great 
spiritual  monarchy,  with  the  bishop  of  Rome  as  its  head. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  bishops  of  Rome  put  forth  a 
double  claim,  namely,  that  they  were  the  supreme  head  of  the 
Church,  and  also  the  rightful,  divinely  appointed  suzerain  of  all 
temporal  princes,  the  "earthly  king  of  kings."  Their  claim  to 
supremacy  in  all  spiritual  matters  was  very  generally  acknowledged 
throughout  at  least  the  Wfest  as  early  as  the  sixth  century,  and  con- 
tinued to  be  respected  by  almost  every  one  until  the  great  Refor- 
mation of  the  sixteenth  century,  when  the  nations  of  Northern 
Europe  revolted,  denied  the  spiritual  authority  of  the  Pope,  and 
separated  themselves  from  the  ancient  ecclesiastical  empire. 

The  papal  claim  to  supremacy  in  temporal  affairs  was  never 
fully  and  willingly  allowed  by  the  secular  rulers  of  Europe ;  yet 
during  a  considerable  part  of  the  Middle  Ages,  particularly 
throughout  the  thirteenth  century,  the  Pope  was  very  generally 
acknowledged  by  kings  and  princes  as  their  superior  and  suzerain 
in  temporal  as  well  as  in  spiritual  matters. 

Early  Organization  of  the  Church. — The  Christian  Church 
very  early  in  its  history  became  an  organized  body,  with  a 
regular  gradation  of  officers,  such  as  presbyters,  bishops,  metro- 
politans or  archbishops,  and  patriarchs.  There  were  at  first  four 
regular  patriarchates,  that  is,  districts  superintended  by  patriarchs. 
These    centred    in    the    great    cities    of  Rome,   Constantinople, 


THE  BISHOP  OF  ROME.  415 

Alexandria,  and  Antioch.  Jerusalem  was  also  made  an  honorary 
patriarchate. 

Primacy  of  the  Bishop  of  Rome.  —  It  is  maintained  by  some 
that  the  patriarchs  at  first  had  equal  and  coordinate  powers ;  that 
is,  that  no  one  of  the  patriarchs  had  preeminence  or  authority  over 
the  others.  But  others  assert  that  the  bishop  of  Rome  from  the 
very  first  was  regarded  as  above  the  others  in  dignity  and  authority, 
and  as  the  divinely  appointed  head  of  the  visible  Church  on  earth. 

However  this  may  be,  the  pontiffs  of  Rome  began  very  early  to 
claim  supremacy  over  all  other  bishops  and  patriarchs.  This  claim 
of  the  Roman  pontiffs  was  based  on  several  alleged  grounds,  the 
chief  of  which  was  that  the  Church  at  Rome  had  been  founded  by 
St.  Peter  himself,  the  first  bishop  of  that  capital,  to  whom  Christ 
had  given  the  keys  of  heaven  and  hell,  and  had  further  invested 
with  superlative  authority  as  a  teacher  and  interpreter  of  the 
Word  by  the  commission,  "  Feed  my  Sheep  ;  .  .  .  feed  my  Lambs," 
thus  giving  into  his  charge  the  entire  flock  of  the  Church.  This 
authority  and  preeminence  conferred  by  the  great  Head  of  the 
Church  upon  Peter  was  held  to  be  transmitted  to  his  successor 
in  the  holy  office. 

Advantage  to  the  Roman  Bishops  of  the  Misfortunes  of  the 
Empire.  —  The  claims  of  the  Roman  bishops  were  greatly  favored 
from  the  very  first  by  the  spell  in  which  the  world  was  held  by  the 
name  and  prestige  of  imperial  Rome.  Thence  it  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  receive  its  commands  in  all  temporal  matters  ;  how  very 
natural,  then,  that  thither  it  should  turn  for  command  and  guid- 
ance in  spiritual  affairs.  The  Roman  bishops  in  thus  occupying 
the  geographical  and  political  centre  of  the  world  enjoyed  a  great 
advantage  over  all  other  bishops  and  patriarchs. 

Nor  was  this  advantage  lost  when  misfortune  befell  the  imperial 
city.  Thus  the  removal  by  Constantine  the  Great  of  the  seat  of 
government  to  the  Bosporus  (see  p.  332),  instead  of  diminishing 
the  power  and  dignity  of  the  Roman  bishops,  tended  powerfully 
to  promote  their  claims  and  authority.  In  the  phrase  of  Dante, 
it  "gave  the  Shepherd  room."  It  left  the  pontiff  the  foremost 
personage  of  Rome. 


416  RISE   OF   THE  PAPAL    POWER. 

Again,  when  the  barbarians  came,  there  came  another  occasion 
for  the  Roman  bishops  to  increase  their  influence,  and  to  raise 
themselves  to  a  position  of  absolute  supremacy  throughout  the 
West.  Rome's  extremity  was  their  opportunity.  Thus  n  will  be 
recalled  how,  mainly  through  the  intercession  of  Leo  the  Great, 
the  fierce  Attila  was  persuaded  to  turn  back  and  leave  Rome 
unpillaged ;  and  how,  through  the  intercession  of  the  same  pious 
bishop,  the  savage  Genseric  was  prevailed  upon  to  spare  the  lives 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  city  at  the  time  of  its  sack  by  the  Van- 
dals (see  pp.  346,  347).  So  when  the  emperors,  the  natural  de- 
fenders of  the  capital,  were  unable  to  protect  it,  the  unarmed 
pastor  was  able,  through  the  awe  and  reverence  inspired  by  his 
holy  office,  to  render  services  that  could  not  but  result  in  bringing 
increased  honor  and  dignity  to  the  Roman  See. 

But  if  the  misfortunes  of  Rome  tended  to  the  enhancement  of 
the  reputation  and  influence  of  the  Roman  bishops,  much  more 
did  the  final  downfall  of  the  capital  tend  to  the  same  end.  Upon 
the  surrender  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  West  into  the  hands  of  the 
emperor  of  the  East,  the  bishops  of  Rome  became  the  most  im- 
portant persons  in  Western  Europe,  and  being  so  far  removed  from 
the  court  at  Constantinople,  gradually  assumed  almost  imperial 
powers.  They  became  the  arbiters  between  the  barbarian  chiefs 
and  the  Italians,  and  to  them  were  referred  for  decision  the  disputes 
arising  between  cities,  states,  and  kings.  It  is  easy  to  understand 
how  directly  and  powerfully  these  things  tended  to  strengthen 
the  authority  and  increase  the  influence  of  the  Roman  See. 

The  Missions  of  Rome. — Again,  the  early  missionary  zeal  of 
the  church  at  Rome  made  her  the  mother  of  many  churches,  all 
of  whom  looked  up  to  her  with  affectionate  and  grateful  loyalty. 
Thus  the  Angles  and  Saxons,  won  to  the  faith  by  the  missionaries 
of  Rome,  conceived  a  deep  veneration  for  the  Holy  See  and  be- 
came her  most  devoted  children.  To  Rome  it  was  that  they  made 
their  most  frequent  pilgrimages,  and  thither  they  sent  their  offer- 
ing of  "  St.  Peter's  penny."  And  when  the  Saxons  became  mis- 
sionaries to  their  pagan  kinsmen  of  the  continent,  they  transplanted 


THE  ICONOCLASTS.  417 

into  the  heart  of  Germany  these  same  feelings  of  filial  attachment 
and  love.  Thus  was  Rome  exalted  in  the  eyes  of  the  children  of 
the  churches  of  the  West,  until  Gregory  II.  (715-731),  writing  the 
Eastern  emperor,  could  say  that  to  these  peoples  the  very  statue  of 
the  founder  of  the  Roman  church  seemed  "  a  god  on  earth." 

The  Iconoclasts. — The  dispute  about  the  worship  of  images, 
known  in  church  history  as  the  Iconoclastic  controversy,  which 
broke  out  in  the  eighth  century  between  the  Greek  churches  of 
the  East  and  the  Latin  churches  of  the  West,  drew  after  it  far- 
reaching  consequences  as  respects  the  growing  power  of  the 
Roman  pontiffs. 

Even  long  before  the  seventh  century,  the  churches  both  in  the 
East  and  in  the  West  had  become  crowded  with  images  or  pict- 
ures of  the  apostles,  saints,  and  martyrs,  which  to  the  ignorant 
classes  at  least  were  objects  of  adoration  and  worship.  A  strong 
party  opposed  to  the  use  of  images1  at  last  arose  in  the  East. 
These  reformers  were  given  the  name  of  Iconoclasts  (image- 
breakers)  . 

Leo  the  Isaurian,  who  came  to  the  throne  of  Constantinople  in 
717,  was  a  most  zealous  Iconoclast.  The  Greek  churches  of  the 
East  having  been  cleared  of  images,  the  emperor  resolved  to  clear 
also  the  Latin  churches  of  the  West  of  these  symbols.  To  this 
end  he  issued  a  decree  that  they  should  not  be  used. 

The  bishop  of  Rome  not  only  opposed  the  execution  of  the 
edict,  but  by  the  ban  of  excommunication  cut  off  the  emperor 
and  all  the  iconoclastic  churches  of  the  East  from  communion 
with  the  true  Catholic  Church.  Though  images  were  permanently 
restored  in  the  Eastern  churches  in  842,  still  by  this  time  other 
causes  of  alienation  had  arisen,  and  the  breach  between  the  two 
sections  of  Christendom  could  not  now  be  closed.  The  final  out- 
come was  the  permanent  separation,  about  the  middle  of  the  eleventh 
century,  of  the  churches  of  the  East  from  those  of  the  West.    The 

1  The  so-called  images  of  the  Greek  Church  were  not  statues,  but  mosaics, 
or  paintings.  The  Eastern  Church  has  at  no  period  sanctioned  the  use  of 
sculptures  in  worship. 


418  RISE   OF  THE  PAPAL  POWER. 

former  became  known  as  the  Greek,  Byzantine,  or  Eastern  Church  ; 
the  latter  as  the  Latin,  Roman,  or  Catholic  Church. 

The  East  was  thus  lost  to  the  Roman  See.  But  the  loss  was 
more  than  made  good  by  fresh  accessions  of  power  in  the  West. 
In  this  quarrel  with  the  Eastern  emperors  the  Roman  bishops 
cast  about  for  an  alliance  with  some  powerful  Western  prince. 
We  have  already  told  the  story  of  the  friendship  of  the  Carolin- 
gian  kings  and  the  Roman  pontiffs,  and  of  the  favors  they  ex- 
changed (see  ch.  xxxvi).  Never  did  friends  render  themselves 
more  serviceable  to  each  other.  The  Popes  made  the  descend- 
ants of  Charles  Martel  kings  and  emperors ;  the  grateful  Frankish 
princes  defended  the  Popes  against  all  their  enemies,  imperial  and 
barbarian,  and  dowering  them  with  cities  and  provinces,  laid  the 
basis  of  their  temporal  sovereignty,  which  continued  for  more  than 
a  thousand  years  (until  1870). 

Ecclesiastical  Jurisdiction :  Appeals  to  Rome.  —  Charlemagne 
had  recognized  the  principle,  held  from  early  times  by  the  Church, 
that  ecclesiastics  should  be  amenable  only  to  the  ecclesiastical 
tribunals,  by  freeing  the  whole  body  of  the  clergy  from  the  juris- 
diction of  the  temporal  courts,  in  criminal  as  well  as  civil  cases. 
Gradually  the  bishops  acquired  the  right  to  try  all  cases  relating 
to  marriage,  trusts,  perjury,  simony,  or  concerning  widows,  orphans, 
or  crusaders,  on  the  ground  that  such  cases  had  to  do  with  reli- 
gion. Even  the  right  to  try  all  criminal  cases  was  claimed  on  the 
ground  that  all  crime  is  sin,  and  hence  can  properly  be  dealt  with 
only  by  the  Church.  Persons  convicted  by  the  ecclesiastical  tri- 
bunals were  subjected  to  penance,  imprisoned  in  the  monasteries, 
or  handed  over  to  the  civil  authorities  for  punishment. 

Thus  by  the  end  of  the  twelfth  century  the  Church  had  ab- 
sorbed, not  only  the  whole  criminal  administration  of  the  clergy, 
but  in  part  that  of  the  laity  also.1  Now  the  particular  feature  of  this 
enormous  extension  of  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Church  tribunals 
which  at  present  it  especially  concerns  us  to  notice,  is  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  principle  that  all  cases  might  be  appealed  or  cited 

1  Hallam,  Middle  Ages,  ch.  vii. 


THE  PAPACY  AND    THE  EMPIRE.  419 

from  the  courts  of  the  bishops  and  archbishops  of  the  different 
European  countries  to  the  Papal  See,  which  thus  became  the 
court  of  last  resort  in  all  cases  affecting  ecclesiastics  or  concerning 
religion.  The  Pope  thus  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  fountain  of 
justice,  and,  in  theory  at  least,  the  supreme  judge  of  Christendom, 
while  emperors  and  kings  and  all  civil  magistrates  bore  the  sword 
simply  as  his  ministers  to  carry  into  effect  his  sentences  and  de- 
crees. 

The  Papacy  and  the  Empire.  —  We  must  now  speak  of  the  re- 
lation of  the  Popes  to  the  Emperors.  About  the  middle  of  the 
tenth  century  Otto  the  Great  of  Germany,  like  a  second  Charle- 
magne, restored  once  more  the  fallen  Imperial  power,  which  now 
became  known  as  the  Holy  Roman  Empire,  the  heads  of  which 
from  this  on  were  the  German  kings  (see  p.  502).  Here  now 
were  two  world-powers,  the  Empire  and  the  Papacy,  whose  claims 
and  ambitions  were  practically  antagonistic  and  irreconcilable. 

There  were  three  different  theories  of  the  divinely  constituted 
relation  of  the  "  World- King  "  and  the  "  World- Priest."  The  first 
was  that  Pope  and  Emperor  were  each  independently  commis- 
sioned by  God,  the  first  to  rule  the  spirits  of  men,  the  second 
to  rule  their  bodies.  Each  reigning  thus  by  original  divine  right, 
neither  is  set  above  the  other,  but  both  are  to  cooperate  and  to 
help  each  other.  The  special  duty  of  the  temporal  power  is  to 
maintain  order  in  the  world  and  to  be  the  protector  of  the  Church. 

The  second  theory,  the  one  held  by  the  Imperial  party,  was  that 
the  Emperor  was  superior  to  the  Pope.  Arguments  from  Scripture 
and  from  the  transactions  of  history  were  not  wanting  to  support 
this  view  of  the  relation  of  the  two  world-powers.  Thus  Christ's 
payment  of  tribute  money  was  cited  as  proof  that  he  regarded  the 
temporal  power  as  superior  to  the  spiritual ;  and  again,  his  submis- 
sion to  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Roman  tribunal  was  held  to  be  a 
recognition  on  his  part  of  the  supremacy  of  the  civil  authority. 
Further,  the  gifts  of  Pepin  and  Charlemagne  to  the  Roman  See 
made  the  Popes,  it  was  maintained,  the  vassals  of  the  Emperors. 

The  third  theory,  the  one  held  by  the  Papal  party,  maintained 


420  RISE    OF   THE  PAPAL  POWER. 

that  the  ordained  relation  of  the  two  powers  was  the  subordination 
of  the  temporal  to  the  spiritual  authority.  This  view  was  main- 
tained by  such  texts  of  Scripture  as  these  :  "  But  he  that  is  spirit- 
ual judgeth  all  things,  yet  he  himself  is  judged  of  no  man ;  " x  "  See, 
I  have  this  day  set  thee  over  the  nations  and  over  the  kingdoms, 
to  root  out  and  to  pull  down,  and  to  destroy  and  to  throw  down, 
to  build  and  to  plant." 2  The  conception  was  further  illustrated 
by  such  comparisons  as  the  following.  As  God  has  set  in  the 
heavens  two  lights,  the  sun  and  the  moon,  so  has  he  established 
on  earth  two  powers,  the  spiritual  and  the  temporal ;  but  as  the 
moon  is  inferior  to  the  sun  and  receives  its  light  from  it,  so  is  the 
Emperor  inferior  to  the  Pope  and  receives  all  power  from  him. 
Again,  the  two  authorities  were  likened  to  the  soul  and  body ;  as 
the  former  rules  over  the  latter,  so  is  it  ordered  that  the  spiritual 
power  shall  rule  over  and  subject  the  temporal. 

The  first  theory  was  the  impracticable  dream  of  lofty  souls  who 
forgot  that  men  are  human.  Christendom  was  virtually  divided 
into  two  hostile  camps,  the  members  of  which  were  respectively 
supporters  of  the  Imperial  and  the  Papal  theory.  The  most  inter- 
esting and  instructive  chapters  of  mediaeval  history  after  the  tenth 
century  are  those  that  record  the  struggles  between  Pope  and 
Emperor,  springing  from  their  efforts  to  reduce  to  practice  these 
irreconcilable  theories.3 

1  I  Cor.  ii.  15.  2  Jer.  i.  10. 

3  For  a  most  admirable  presentation  of  this  whole  subject,  consult  Bryce's 
The  Holy  Roman  Empire. 


SECOND  PERIOD.  — THE  AGE  OF  REVIVAL. 

[FROM   THE   OPENING   OF  THE    ELEVENTH   CENTURY  TO  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA 
BY   COLUMBUS    IN   1492.) 


CHAPTER    XL. 

FEUDALISM  AND  CHIVALRY, 
i.   Feudalism. 

Feudalism  defined.  —  Feudalism  is  the  name  given  to  a  special 
form  of  society  and  government,  based  upon  a  peculiar  military 
tenure  of  land  which  prevailed  in  Europe  during  the  latter  half 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  attaining,  however,  its  most  perfect  develop- 
ment in  the  eleventh,  twelfth,  and  thirteenth  centuries. 

A  feudal  estate,  which  might  embrace  a  few  acres  or  an  entire 
province,  was  called  a  fief,  or  feud,  whence  the  term  Feudalism. 
The  person  granting  a  fief  was  called  the  suzerain,  liege,  or  lord; 
the  one  receiving  it,  his  vassal,  liegeman,  or  retainer. 

The  Ideal  System.  — The  few  definitions  given  above  will  render 
intelligible  the  following  explanation  of  the  theory  of  the  Feudal 
System. 

In  theory,  all  the  soil  of  the  country  was  held  by  the  king  as  a 
fief  from  God  (in  practice,  the  king's  title  was  his  good  sword), 
granted  on  conditions  of  fealty  to  right  and  justice.  Should  the 
king  be  unjust  or  wicked,  he  forfeited  the  kingdom,  and  it  might 
be  taken  from  him  and  given  to  another.  According  to  Papal 
theorists  it  was  the  Pope  who,  as  God's  vicar  on  earth,  had  the 
right  to  pronounce  judgment  against  a  king,  depose  him,  and  put 
another  in  his  place. 

In  the  same  way  that  the  king  received  his  fief  from  God,  so  he 


422  FEUDALISM. 

might  grant  it  out  in  parcels  to  his  chief  men,  they,  in  return 
for  it,  promising,  in  general,  to  be  faithful  to  him  as  their  lord, 
and  to  serve  and  aid  him.  Should  these  men,  now  vassals,  be 
in  any  way  untrue  to  their  engagement,  they  forfeited  their  fiefs, 
and  these  might  be  resumed  by  their  suzerain  and  bestowed  upon 
others. 

In  like  manner  these  immediate  vassals  of  the  king  or  suzerain 
might  parcel  out  their  domains  in  smaller  tracts  to  others,  on  the 
same  conditions  as  those  upon  which  they  had  themselves  received 
theirs  ;  and  so  on  down  through  any  number  of  stages. 

We  have  thus  far  dealt  only  with  the  soil  of  a  country.  We 
must  next  notice  what  disposition  was  made  of  the  people  under 
this  system. 

The  king  in  receiving  his  fief  was  intrusted  with  sovereignty  over 
all  persons  living  upon  it :  he  became  their  commander,  their  law- 
maker, and  their  judge  —  in  a  word,  their  absolute  and  irresponsible 
ruler.  Then,  when  he  parcelled  out  his  fief  among  his  great  men, 
he  invested  them,  within  the  limits  of  the  fiefs  granted,  with  all 
his  own  sovereign  rights.  Each  vassal  became  a  virtual  sovereign 
in  his  own  domain.  And  when  these  great  vassals  divided  their 
fiefs  and  granted  them  to  others,  they  in  turn  invested  their  vassals 
with  those  powers  of  sovereignty  with  which  they  themselves  had 
been  clothed.  Thus  every  holder  of  a  fief  became  "  monarch  of 
all  he  surveyed." 

To  illustrate  the  workings  of  the  system,  we  will  suppose  the 
king  or  suzerain  to  be  in  need  of  an  army.  He  calls  upon  his  own 
immediate  vassals  for  aid ;  these  in  turn  call  upon  their  vassals ; 
and  so  the  order  runs  down  through  the  various  ranks  of  retainers. 
The  retainers  in  the  lowest  rank  rally  around  their  respective  lords, 
who,  with  their  bands,  gather  about  their  lords,  and  so  on  up 
through  the  rising  tiers  of  the  system,  until  the  immediate  vassals 
of  the  suzerain,  or  chief  lord,  present  themselves  before  him 
with  their  graduated  trains  of  followers.  The  array  constitutes  a 
feudal  army,  —  a  splendidly  organized  body  in  theory,  but  in  fact 
an  extremely  poor  instrument  for  warfare. 


ROMAN  AND    TEUTONIC  ELEMENTS.  423 

Such  was  the  ideal  feudal  state.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  the 
ideal  was  never  perfectly  realized.  The  system  simply  made  more 
or  less  distant  approaches  to  it  in  the  several  European  countries. 

Roman  and  Teutonic  Elements  in  the  System.  —  Like  many 
another  institution  that  grew  up  on  the  conquered  soil  of  the 
empire,  Feudalism  was  of  a  composite  character ;  that  is,  it  con- 
tained both  Roman  and  Teutonic  elements.  The  spirit  of  the 
institution  was  barbarian,  but  the  form  was  classical.  We  might 
illustrate  the  idea  we  are  trying  to  convey,  by  referring  to  the 
mediaeval  papal  church.  It,  while  Hebrew  in  spirit,  was  Roman 
in  form.  It  had  shaped  itself  upon  the  model  of  the  empire,  and 
was  thoroughly  imperial  in  its  organization.  Thus  was  it  with 
Feudalism.  Beneath  the  Roman  garb  it  assumed,  beat  a  German 
life. 

The  Ceremony  of  Homage.  —  A  fief  was  conferred  by  a  very 
solemn  and  peculiar  ceremony  called  homage.  The  person  about 
to  become  a  vassal,  kneeling  with  uncovered  head,  placed  his 
hands  in  those  of  his  future  lord,  and  solemnly  vowed  to  be  hence- 
forth his  man  (Latin  homo,  whence  "homage  "),  and  to  serve  him 
faithfully  even  with  his  life.  This  part  of  the  ceremony,  sealed 
with  a  kiss,  was  what  properly  constituted  the  ceremony  of  homage. 
It  was  accompanied  by  an  oath  of  fealty,  and  the  whole  was  con- 
cluded by  the  act  of  investiture,  whereby  the  lord  put  his  vassal 
in  actual  possession  of  the  land,  or  by  placing  in  his  hand  a  clod 
of  earth  or  a  twig,  symbolized  the  delivery  to  him  of  the  estate 
for  which  he  had  just  now  done  homage  and  sworn  fealty. 

The  Relations  of  Lord  and  Vassal.  —  In  general  terms  the 
duty  of  the  vassal  was  service  ;  that  of  the  lord,  protection.  The 
most  honorable  service  required  of  the  vassal,  and  the  one  most 
willingly  rendered  in  a  martial  age,  was  military  aid.  The  liegeman 
must  always  be  ready  to  follow  his  lord  upon  his  military  expedi- 
tions ;  he  must  defend  his  lord  in  battle ;  if  he  should  be  un- 
horsed, must  give  him  his  own  animal ;  and,  if  he  should  be  made 
a  prisoner,  must  offer  himself  as  a  hostage  for  his  release. 

Among  other  incidents  attaching  to  a  fief  were  escheat,  for- 


424-  FEUDALISM. 

feiture,  and  aids.  By  Escheat  was  meant  the  falling  back  of  the 
fief  into  the  hands  of  the  lord  through  failure  of  heirs.  If  the 
fief  lapsed  through  disloyalty  or  other  misdemeanor  on  the  part  of 
the  vassal,  this  was  known  as  Forfeiture.  Aids  were  sums  of  money 
which  the  lord  had  a  right  to  demand,  in  order  to  defray  the  expense 
of  knighting  his  eldest  son,  of  marrying  his  eldest  daughter,  or  for 
ransoming  his  own  person  in  case  of  captivity. 

The  chief  return  that  the  lord  was  bound  to  make  to  the  vassal 
as  a  compensation  for  these  various  services,  was  counsel  and  pro- 
tection—  by  no  means  a  small  return  in  an  age  of  turmoil  and 
insecurity. 

Development  of  the  Feudal  System.  —  After  the  death  of  Char- 
lemagne and  the  partition  of  his  great  empire  among  his  feeble 
successors,  it  seemed  as  though  the  world  was  again  falling  back 
into  chaos.  The  bonds  of  society  seemed  entirely  broken.  The 
strong  oppressed  the  weak  j  the  nobles  became  highway-robbers 
and  marauders. 

It  was  this  distracted  state  of  things  that,  during  the  ninth  and 
tenth  centuries,  caused  the  rapid  development  of  the  Feudal  Sys- 
tem. It  was  the  only  form  of  social  organization,  the  only  form 
of  government  that  it  was  practicable  to  maintain  in  that  rude, 
transitional  age.  All  classes  of  society,  therefore,  hastened  to  enter 
the  system,  in  order  to  secure  the  protection  which  it  alone  could 
afford.  Kings,  princes,  and  wealthy  persons  who  had  large  landed 
possessions  which  they  had  never  parcelled  out  as  fiefs,  were  now 
led  to  do  so,  that  their  estates  might  be  held  by  tenants  bound  to 
protect  them  by  all  the  sacred  obligations  of  homage  and  fealty. 
Again,  the  smaller  proprietors  who  held  their  estates  by  allodial 
tenure  voluntarily  surrendered  them  into  the  hands  of  some  neigh- 
boring lord,  and  then  received  them  again  from  him  as  fiefs, 
that  they  might  claim  protection  as  vassals.  They  deemed  this 
better  than  being  robbed  of  their  property  altogether.  Thus  it 
came  that  almost  all  the  allodial  lands  of  France,  Germany,  Italy, 
and  Northern  Spain  were,  during  the  ninth,  tenth,  and  eleventh 
centuries,  converted  into  feudal  estates,  or  fiefs. 


CLASSES  OF  FEUDAL   SO  CLE  TV.  425 

Moreover,  for  like  reasons  and  in  like  manner,  churches,  monas- 
teries, and  cities  became  members  of  the  Feudal  System.  They 
granted  out  their  vast  possessions  as  fiefs,  and  thus  became  suze- 
rains and  lords.  Bishops  and  abbots  became  the  heads  of  great 
bands  of  retainers,  and  led  military  expeditions,  like  temporal 
chiefs.  On  the  other  hand,  these  same  monasteries  and  towns,  as 
a  means  of  security  and  protection,  did  homage  to  some  powerful 
lord,  and  thus  came  in  vassalage  to  him. 

In  this  way  were  Church  and  State,  all  classes  of  society  from 
the  wealthiest  suzerain  to  the  humblest  tenant,  bound  together 
by  feudal  ties.  Everything  was  impressed  with  the  stamp  of 
Feudalism. 

Classes  of  Feudal  Society.  —  Besides  the  nobility,  or  the  landed 
class,  there  were  under  the  Feudal  System  three  other  classes, 
namely,  freemen,  serfs  or  villeins,  and  slaves.  These  lower  classes 
made  up  the  great  bulk  of  the  population  of  a  feudal  state.  The 
freemen  were  the  inhabitants  of  chartered  towns,  and  in  some 
countries  the  yeomanry,  or  small  farmers,  who  did  not  hold  their 
lands  by  a  regular  feudal  tenure.  The  serfs,  or  villeins,  were  the 
laborers  who  cultivated  the  ground.  The  peculiarity  of  their  con- 
dition was  that  they  were  not  allowed  to  move  from  the  estate 
where  they  lived,  and  when  the  land  was  sold  they  passed  with  it 
just  like  any  fixture.  The  slaves  constituted  a  still  lower  class 
made  up  of  captives  in  war  or  of  persons  condemned  to  bondage 
as  a  penalty  for  crime.  These  chattel  slaves,  however,  almost 
disappeared  before  the  thirteenth  century,  being  converted  into 
the  lowest  order  of  serfs,  which  was  a  step  toward  freedom. 

Castles  of  the  Nobles.  —  The  lawless  and  violent  character  of 
the  times  during  which  Feudalism  prevailed  is  well  shown  by  the 
nature  of  the  residences  of  the  nobles.  These  were  strong  stone 
fortresses,  usually  perched  upon  some  rocky  eminence,  and  de- 
fended by  moats  and  towers.  France,  Germany,  Italy,  Northern 
Spain,  England,  and  Scotland,  in  which  countries  the  Feudal  Sys- 
tem became  most  thoroughly  developed,  fairly  bristled  with  these 
fortified  residences  of  the  nobility.     One  of  the  most  striking  and 


426 


FEUDALISM. 


picturesque  features  of  the  scenery  of  many  districts  of  Europe 
at  the  present  time  is  the  ivy-mantled  towers  and  walls  of  these 
feudal  castles,  now  falling  into  ruins. 

Causes  of  the  Decay  of  Feudalism.  —  Chief  among  the  various 
causes  which  undermined  and  at  length  overthrew  Feudalism, 
were  the  hostility  to  the  system  of  the  kings  and  the  common 
people,  the  Crusades,  the  revolt  of  the  cities,  and  the  introduction 
of  fire-arms  in  the  art  of  war. 


FEUDAL   CASTLE   AT    ROUEN. 


The  Feudal  System  was  hated  and  opposed  by  both  the  royal 
power  and  the  people.  Kings  opposed  it  and  sought  to  break  it 
down,  because  it  left  them  only  the  semblance  of  power.  The 
people  always  hated  it  for  the  reason  that  under  it  they  were  re- 
garded as  of  less  value  than  the  game  in  the  lord's  hunting-park. 

The  Crusades,  or  Holy  Wars,  that  agitated  all  Europe  during  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  did  much  to  weaken  the  power  of 
the  nobles ;  for  in  order  to  raise  money  for  their  expeditions,  they 
frequently  sold  or  mortgaged  their  estates,  and  in  this  way  power 
and  influence  passed  into  the  hands  of  the  kings  or  of  the  wealthy 
merchants  of  the  cities.     Many  of  the  great  nobles  also  perished 


DEFECTS   OF  THE  FEUDAL   SYSTEM.  427 

in  battle  with  the  Infidels,  and  their  lands  escheated  to  their  suz- 
erain, whose  domains  were  thus  augmented. 

The  growth  of  the  towns  also  tended  to  the  same  end.  As  they 
increased  in  wealth  and  influence,  they  became  able  to  resist  the 
exactions  and  tyranny  of  the  lord  in  whose  fief  they  happened  to 
be,  and  eventually  were  able  to  secede,  as  it  were,  from  his  author- 
ity, and  to  make  of  themselves  little  republics  (see  p.  464). 

Again,  the  use  of  gunpowder  in  war  hastened  the  downfall  of 
Feudalism,  by  rendering  the  yeoman  foot-soldier  equal  to  the 
armor-clad  knight.  "  It  made  all  men  of  the  same  height,"  as 
Carlyle  puts  it. 

But  it  is  to  be  noted  that,  though  Feudalism  as  a  system  of 
government  virtually  disappeared  during  the  latter  part  of  the 
mediaeval  age,  it  still  continued  to  exist  as  a  social  organization. 
The  nobles  lost  their  power  and  authority  as  rulers  and  magis- 
trates, as  petty  sovereigns,  but  retained  generally  their  titles,  privi- 
leges, and  social  distinctions. 

Defects  of  the  Feudal  System.  —  Feudalism  was  perhaps  the 
best  form  of  social  organization  that  it  was  possible  to  maintain 
in  Europe  during  the  mediaeval  period  j  yet  it  had  many  and 
serious  defects,  which  rendered  it  very  far  from  being  a  perfect 
social  or  political  system.  Among  its  chief  faults  may  be  pointed 
out  the  two  following.  First,  it  rendered  impossible  the  formation 
of  strong  national  governments.  Every  country  was  divided  and 
subdivided  into  a  vast  number  of  practically  independent  prin- 
cipalities. Thus,  in  the  tenth  century  France  was  partitioned 
among  nearly  two  hundred  overlords,  all  exercising  equal  and 
coordinate  powers  of  sovereignty.  The  enormous  estates  of  these 
great  lords  were- again  divided  into  about  70,000  smaller  fiefs. 

In  theory,  as  we  have  seen,  the  holders  of  these  petty  estates 
were  bound  to  serve  and  obey  their  overlords,  and  these  great 
nobles  were  in  turn  the  sworn  vassals  of  the  French  king.  But 
many  of  these  lords  were  richer  and  stronger  than  the  king  him- 
self, and  if  they  chose  to  cast  off  their  allegiance  to  him,  he  found 
it  impossible  to  reduce  them  to  obedience. 


428  FEUDALISM. 

A  second  evil  of  the  institution  was  its  exclusiveness.  It  was, 
in  theory,  only  the  person  of  noble  birth  that  could  become  the 
holder  of  a  fief.  The  feudal  lords  constituted  a  proud  and  op- 
pressive aristocracy.  It  was  only  as  the  lower  classes  in  the  dif- 
ferent countries  gradually  wrested  from  the  feudal  nobility  their 
special  and  unfair  privileges,  that  a  better  forrrf  of  society  arose, 
and  civilization  began  to  make  more  rapid  progress. 

Good  Results  of  the  System.  —  The  most  noteworthy  of  the 
good  results  springing  from  the  Feudal  System  was  the  develop- 
ment among  its  privileged  members  of  that  individualism,  that  love 
of  personal  independence,  which  we  have  seen  to  be  a  marked 
trait  of  the  Teutonic  character  (see  p.  369).  Turbulent,  violent, 
and  refractory  as  was  the  feudal  aristocracy  of  Europe,  it  per- 
formed the  grand  service  of  keeping  alive  during  the  later  medi- 
aeval period  the  spirit  of  liberty.  It  prevented  Royalty  from 
becoming  as  despotic  as  it  would  otherwise  have  become.  Thus 
in  England,  for  instance,  the  feudal  lords  held  such  tyrannical 
rulers  as  King  John  in  check,  until  such  time  as  the  yeomen  and 
the  burghers  were  bold  enough  and  strong  enough  alone  to  resist 
their  despotically  inclined  sovereigns.  In  France,  where,  unfortu- 
nately, the  power  of  the  feudal  nobles  was  broken  too  soon,  — 
before  the  common  people,  the  Third  Estate,  were  prepared  to 
take  up  the  struggle  for  liberty,  —  the  result  was  the  growth  of 
that  autocratic,  despotic  Royalty  which  led  the  French  people  to 
the  Revolution  and  the  Reign  of  Terror. 

Another  of  the  good  effects  of  Feudalism  was  the  impulse  it 
gave  to  certain  forms  of  polite  literature.  Just  as  learning  and 
philosophy  were  fostered  by  the  seclusion  of  the  cloister,  so  were 
poetry  and  romance  fostered  by  the  open  and  joyous  hospitalities 
of  the  baronial  hall.  The  castle  door  was  always  open  to  the  wan- 
dering singer  and  story-teller,  and  it  was  amidst  the  scenes  of 
festivity  within  that  the  ballads  and  romances  of  mediaeval  min- 
strelsy and  literature  had  their  birth. 

Still  another  service  which  Feudalism  rendered  to  civilization 
was  the  development  within  the  baronial  castle  of  those  ideas  and 


ORIGIN  OF  THE  INSTITUTION. 


429 


sentiments  —  among  others,  a  nice  sense  of  honor  and  an  exalted 
consideration  for  the  female  sex  —  which  found  their  noblest  ex- 
pression in  Chivalry,  of  which  institution  and  its  good  effects  upon 
the  social  life  of  Europe  we  shall  now  proceed  to  speak. 


2.    Chivalry. 

Chivalry  defined :  Origin  of  the  Institution.  —  Chivalry  has  been 
aptly  denned  as  the  "  Flower  of  Feudalism."  It  was  a  military  in- 
stitution, or  order, 
the  members  of 
which,  called 
knights,  were 
pledged  to  the 
protection  of  the 
church,  and  to  the 
defence  of  the 
weak  and  the  op- 
pressed. Although 
the  germs  of  the 
system  may  be 
found  in  society 
before  the  age  of 
Charlemagne,  still 
Chivalry  did  not 
assume  its  distinc- 
tive character  un- 
til the  eleventh 
century,  and  died 
out  during  the  fif- 
teenth. 

Chivalry  seems 
to  have  had  France 
for  its  cradle.  That 
country  at  least  was  its  true  home 


A   KNIGHT  IN   FULL  ARMOR. 
(Drawing  by  Alphonse  de   Neuville  ) 

There  it  was  that  it  exhibited 


430 


CHIVALRY. 


its  most  complete  and  romantic  development.  Yet  its  influence 
was  felt  everywhere  and  in  everything.  It  colored  all  the  events  and 
enterprises  of  the  latter  half  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  literature 
of  the  period  is  instinct  with  its  spirit.  The  Crusades,  or  Holy 
Wars,  the  greatest  undertakings  of  the  mediaeval  ages,  were  pre- 
dominantly enterprises  of  the  Christian  chivalry  of  Europe. 

Training  of  the  Knight.  —  When  Chivalry  had  once  become 
established,  all  the  sons  of  the  nobility,  save  such  as  were  to  enter 
the  holy  orders  of  the  Church,  were  set  apart  and  disciplined  for  its 
service.     The  sons  of  the  poorer  nobles  were  usually  placed  in  the 

family  of  some  supe- 
rior lord  of  renown 
and  wealth,  whose 
castle  became  a  sort 
of  school,  where  they 
were  trained  in  the 
duties  and  exercises 
of  knighthood. 

This  education  be- 
gan at  the  early  age 
of  seven,  the  youth 
bearing  the  name  of 
page  or  varlet  until 
he  attained  the  age 
of  fourteen,  when  he 
acquired  the  title  of 
squire  or  esquire.  At 
the  age  of  twenty- 
one  the  squire  became  a  knight,  being  then  introduced  to  the 
order  of  knighthood  by  a  peculiar  and  impressive  service.  After 
a  long  fast  and  vigil,  the  candidate  listened  to  a  lengthy  ser- 
mon on  his  duties  as  a  knight.  Then  kneeling,  as  in  the  feudal 
ceremony  of  homage,  before  the  lord  conducting  the  services,  he 
vowed  to  defend  religion  and  the  ladies,  to  succor  the  distressed, 
and  ever  to  be  faithful  to  his  companion  knights.     His  arms  were 


CONFERRING    KNIGHTHOOD  ON    THE 
BATTLE. 


% 


THE    TOURNAMENT. 


431 


now  presented  to  him,  and  his  sword  girded  on,  when  the  lord, 
striking  him  with  the  flat  of  his  sword  on  the  shoulders  or  the 
neck,  said,  "  In  the  name  of  God,  of  St.  Michael,  and  of  St. 
George,  I  dub  thee  knight :  be  brave,  bold,  and  loyal." 

Sometimes  knighthood  was  conferred  with  less  ceremony  upon 
the  battle-field,  as  the  reward  of  signal  bravery  or  address. 

The  Tournament.  —  The  tournament  was  the  favorite  amuse- 
ment of  the  age  of  Chivalry.  It  was  a  mimic  battle  between  two 
companies  of  noble  knights,  armed  usually  with  pointless  swords  or 


A   TOURNAMENT. 

blunted  lances.  In  the  universal  esteem  in  which  the  participants 
were  held,  it  reminds  us  of  the  Sacred  Games  of  the  Greeks; 
while  in  the  fierce  and  sanguinary  character  it  sometimes  assumed, 
especially  before  it  was  brought  fully  under  the  spirit  of  Chivalry,  it 
recalls  the  gladiatorial  combats  of  the  Roman  amphitheatre. 

Decline  of  Chivalry. — The  fifteenth  century  was  the  evening 
of  Chivalry.  The  decline  of  the  system  resulted  from  the  opera- 
tion of  the  same  causes  that  effected  the  overthrow  of  Feudalism. 
The  changes  in  the  mode  of  warfare  which  helped  to  do  away 
with  the  feudal  baron  and  his  mail-clad  retainers,  likewise  tended 


432  CHIVALRY. 

to  destroy  knight-errantry.  And  then  as  civilization  advanced, 
new  feelings  and  sentiments  began  to  claim  the  attention,  and  to 
work  upon  the  imagination  of  men.  Governments,  too,  became 
more  regular,  and  the  increased  order  and  security  of  society 
rendered  less  needful  the  services  of  the  gallant  knight  in  behalf 
of  distressed  maidens. 

Influence  of  Chivalry.  —  The  system  of  Chivalry  had  many 
vices,  chief  among  which  were  its  exclusive,  aristocratic  tenden- 
cies. An  indignant  writer  declares  that  "it  is  not  probable  that 
the  knights  supposed  they  could  be  guilty  of  injustice  to  the  lower 
classes."  These  were  regarded  with  indifference  or  contempt, 
and  considered  as  destitute  of  any  claims  upon  those  of  noble 
birth  as  were  beasts  of  burden  or  the  game  of  the  chase.  It  is 
always  the  young  and  beautiful  lady  of  gentle  birth  whose  wrongs 
the  valiant  knight  is  risking  his  life  to  avenge,  always  the  smiles  of 
the  "queen  of  love  and  beauty"  for  which  he  is  splintering  his 
lance  in  the  fierce  tournament.  The  fostering  of  this  aristocratic 
spirit  was  one  of  the  most  serious  faults  of  Chivalry. 

But  to  speak  of  the  beneficial,  refining  influences  of  Chivalry, 
we  should  say  that  it  undoubtedly  contributed  powerfully  to  lift 
that  sentiment  of  respect  for  the  gentler  sex  that  characterized  all 
the  Northern  nations,  into  that  reverence  for  womanhood  which 
forms  one  of  the  distinguishing  characteristics  of  the  present  age. 

Again,  Chivalry  did  much  towards  producing  that  type  of  man- 
hood among  us  which  we  rightly  think  to  surpass  any  ever  formed 
under  the  influences  of  antiquity.  Just  as  Christianity  gave  to  the 
world  an  ideal  manhood  which  it  was  to  strive  to  realize,  so  did 
Chivalry  hold  up  an  ideal  to  which  men  were  to  conform  their 
lives.  Men,  indeed,  have  never  perfectly  realized  either  the  ideal 
of  Christianity  or  that  of  Chivalry ;  but  the  influence  which  these 
two  ideals  has  had  in  shaping  and  giving  character  to  the  lives  of 
men  cannot  be  overestimated.  Together,  through  the  enthusiasm 
and  effort  awakened  for  their  realization,  they  produced  a  new 
type  of  manhood,  which  we  indicate  by  the  phrase  "a  knightly 
and  Christian  character." 


INTRODUCTORY. 


433 


■"■:.  '  .-"  4f  ■ 

"      - 

Ijll  IPS 

#\\  r-/x  \//           iG:fe-!S 

LANDING    IN    ENGLAND    OF   WILLIAM   OF   NORMANDY.     (From  the  Bayeux  Tapestry.) 


CHAPTER   XLI. 

THE  NORMAN   CONQUEST  OF  ENGLAND. 

Introductory.  —  The  history  of  the  Normans  —  the  name,  it  will 
be  recalled,  of  the  transformed  Scandinavians  who  settled  in 
Northern  Gaul  (see  p.  413) — is  simply  a  continuation  of  the 
story  of  the  Northmen.  The  most  important  of  the  enterprises 
of  the  Normans,  and  one  followed  by  consequences  of  the  greatest 
magnitude  not  only  to  the  conquered  people,  but  indirectly  to  the 
world,  was  their  conquest  of  England.1 

Events  leading  up  to  the  Conquest.  —  In  the  year  1066  Edward 
the  Confessor  died,  in  whose  person,  it  will  be  recalled,  the  old 
English  line  was  restored  after  the  Danish  usurpation  (see  p.  412). 
Immediately  the  Witan,  that  is,  the  assembly  of  the  chief  men 


1  Not  long  before  the  Normans  conquered  England,  they  succeeded  in  gain- 
ing a  foothold  in  the  south  of  Italy,  where  they  established  a  sort  of  republic, 
which  ultimately  included  the  island  of  Sicily.  The  fourth  president  of  the 
commonwealth  was  the  celebrated  Robert  Guiscard  (d.  1085),  who  spread  the 
renown  of  the  Norman  name  throughout  the  Mediterranean  lands.  This 
Norman  state,  converted  finally  into  a  kingdom,  lasted  until  late  in  the  twelfth 
century  (1194). 


434  THE  NORMAN  CONQUEST   OF  ENGLAND. 

of  the  nation,  in  accordance  with  the  dying  wish  of  the  king, 
chose  Harold,  Earl  of  the  West  Saxons,  son  of  the  famous  Godwin, 
and  the  best  and  strongest  man  in  all  England,  to  be  his  suc- 
cessor. 

When  the  news  of  the  action  of  the  Witan  and  of  Harold's 
acceptance  of  the  English  crown  was  carried  across  the  channel 
to  William,  Duke  of  Normandy,  he  was  really  or  feignedly 
transported  with  rage.  He  declared  that  Edward,  who  was  his 
cousin,  had  during  his  lifetime  promised  the  throne  to  him,  and 
that  Harold  had  assented  to  this,  and  by  solemn  oath  engaged  to 
sustain  him.  He  now  demanded  of  Harold  that  he  surrender  to 
him  the  usurped  throne,  threatening  the  immediate  invasion  of  the 
island  in  case  he  refused.  King  Harold  answered  the  demand  by 
expelling  from  the  country  the  Normans  who  had  followed  Edward 
into  the  kingdom,  and  by  collecting  fleets  and  armies  for  the 
defence  of  his  dominions. 

While  Harold  was  watching  the  southern  coasts  against  the 
Normans,  a  Danish  host  appeared  in  the  north,  led  by  Tostig, 
the  traitor  brother  of  the  English  king,  and  Harold  Hardrada, 
king  of  Norway.  The  English  army  in  that  quarter,  attempting 
to  withstand  the  invaders,  was  cut  to  pieces ;  and  the  important 
city  of  York  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Northmen.  As  soon  as 
news  of  this  disaster  was  borne  to  King  Harold  in  the  south,  he 
instantly  marched  northward  with  his  army,  and  at  Stamford 
Bridge  met  the  invaders,  and  there  gained  a  decisive  victory  over 
them. 

The  Battle  of  Hastings  (1066).  —  The  festivities  that  followed 
the  victory  of  Stamford  Bridge  were  not  yet  ended,  when  a  mes- 
senger from  the  south  brought  to  Harold  intelligence  of  the  land- 
ing of  the  Normans.  Hurrying  southward  with  his  army,  Harold 
came  face  to  face  with  the  forces  of  William  at  Senlac,  a  short 
distance  from  the  port  of  Hastings. 

The  battle  soon  opened  —  the  battle  that  was  to  determine  the 
fate  of  England.  It  was  begun  by  a  horseman  riding  out  from 
the  Norman  lines  and  advancing  alone  toward  the  English  army, 


DISTRIBUTION  OF   THE  LAND. 


435 


tossing  up  his  sword  and  skilfully  catching  it  as  it  fell,  and  singing 
all  the  while  the  stirring  battle-song  of  Charlemagne  and  Roland 
(see  p.  405).  The  English  watched  with  astonishment  this  ex- 
hibition of  "  careless  dexterity,"  and  if  they  did  not  contrast  the 
vivacity  and  nimbleness  of  the  Norman  foe  with  their  own  heavy  and 
clumsy  manners,  others  at  least  have  not  failed  to  do  so  for  them. 

The  battle  once  joined,  the  conflict  was  long  and  terrific.  The 
day  finally  went  against  the  English.  Harold  fell,  pierced  through 
the  eye  by  an  arrow  j  and  William  was  master  of  the  field  (1066). 

The  conqueror  now  marched  upon  London,  and  at  Westminster 
Abbey,  on  Christmas  Day,  1066,  was  crowned  and  anointed  king 
of  England. 


BATTLE   OF    HASTINGS.     (From  the  Bayeux  Tapestry.) 


The  Distribution  of  the  Land.  — Almost  the  first  act  of  William 
after  he  had  established  his  power  in  England  was  to  fulfil  his 
promise  to  the  nobles  who  had  aided  him  in  his  enterprise,  by  dis- 
tributing among  them  the  unredeemed1  estates  of  the  English  who 
had  fought  at  Hastings  in  defence  of  their  king  and  country. 
Large  as  was  the  number  of  these  confiscated  estates,  there  would 
have  been  a  lack  of  land  to  satisfy  all,  had  not  subsequent  upris- 
ings against  the  authority  of  William  afforded  him  an  opportunity 


1  "  When  the  lands  of  all  those  who  had  fought  for  Harold  were  confis- 
cated, those  who  were  willing  to  acknowledge  William  were  allowed  to  redeem 
theirs,  either  paying  money  at  once,  or  giving  hostages  for  the  payment."  — 
Stubbs,  Const.  Hist.  I.  258. 


436  THE  NORMAN  CONQUEST  OF  ENGLAND. 

to  confiscate  almost  all  the  soil  of  England  as  forfeited  by  trea- 
son. 

Profiting  by  the  lesson  taught  by  the  wretched  condition  of 
France,  which  country  was  kept  in  a  state  of  constant  turmoil  by 
a  host  of  feudal  chiefs  and  lords  many  of  whom  were  almost  or 
quite  as  powerful  as  the  king  himself,  William  took  care  that  in  the 
distribution  no  feudatory  should  receive  an  entire  shire,  save  in  two 
or  three  exceptional  cases.  To  the  great  lord  to  whom  he  must 
needs  give  a  large  fief,  he  granted,  not  a  continuous  tract  of  land, 
but  several  estates,  or  manors,  scattered  in  different  parts  of  the 
country,  in  order  that  there  might  be  no  dangerous  concentration 
of  property  or  power  in  the  hands  of  the  vassal.  He  also  re- 
quired of  all  the  sub-vassals  of  the  realm,  in  addition  to  their  oath 
of  allegiance  to  their  own  lord,  an  oath  of  fealty  to  the  crown. 
This  was  a  most  important  modification  of  feudal  custom.  On 
the  Continent,  the  sub-tenant  swore  allegiance  to  his  own  lord 
simply,  and  was  in  duty  bound  to  aid  him  in  all  his  wars,  even  in 
one  against  the  sovereign.  But  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  himself 
exacted  by  William  of  all  holders  of  fiefs,  just  reversed  this,  and 
made  it  the  first  duty  of  the  sub-vassal,  even  in  the  case  of  a  war 
between  his  lord  and  the  king,  to  follow  and  obey  the  king. 
Furthermore,  William  denied  to  his  feudatories  the  right  of  coin- 
ing money  or  making  laws ;  and  by  other  wise  restrictions  upon 
their  power,  he  saved  England  from  those  endless  contentions  and 
petty  wars  that  were  distracting  almost  every  other  country  of 
Europe. 

The  Norman  Successors  of  the  Conqueror.  —  For  nearly  three- 
quarters  of  a  century  after  the  death  of  William  the  Conqueror, 
England  was  ruled  by  Norman  kings.1  The  latter  part  of  this 
period  was  a  troublous  time.  The  succession  to  the  crown  com- 
ing into  dispute,  civil  war  broke  out.     The  result  of  the  contention 

1  William  II.,  known  as  Rufus  "the  Red"  (1087-1100);  Henry  I.,  sur- 
named  Beauclerc,  "the  good  scholar"  (1100-1135);  and  Stephen  of  Blois 
(1135-1154).  William  and  Henry  were  sons,  and  Stephen  a  grandson,  of  the 
conqueror. 


I 


ADVANTAGES   TO  ENGLAND.  437 

was  a  decline  in  the  royal  power,  and  the  ascendency  of  the  Nor- 
man barons,  who  for  a  time  made  England  the  scene  of  the  same 
feudal  anarchy  that  prevailed  at  this  time  upon  the  Continent. 
Finally,  in  1154,  the  Norman  dynasty  gave  place  to  that  of  the 
Plantagenets.  Under  Henry  II.,  the  first  king  of  the  new  house, 
and  an  energetic  and  strong  ruler,  the  barons  were  again  brought 
into  proper  subjection  to  the  crown,  and  many  castles  which  had 
been  built  without  royal  permission  during  the  preceding  anarchical 
period,  and  some  of  which  at  least  were  little  better  than  robbers' 
dens,  were  destroyed. 

Advantages  to  England  of  the  Norman  Conquest.  —  The  most 
important  and  noteworthy  result  of  the  Norman  Conquest  of 
England,  was  the  establishment  in  the  island  of  a  strong  central- 
ized government.  England  now  for  the  first  time  became  a  real 
kingdom. 

A  second  result  of  the  Conquest  was  the  founding  of  a  new 
feudal  aristocracy.  Even  to  this  day  there  is  a  great  preponder- 
ance of  Norman  over  English  blood  in  the  veins  of  the  nobility  of 
England. 

A  third  result  was  the  bringing  of  England  into  more  intimate 
relations  with  the  nations  of  continental  Europe,  by  which  means 
her  advance  in  art,  science,  and  general  culture  was  greatly  pro- 
moted. 


438 


CAUSES   OF   THE    CRUSADES. 


CRUSADERS   ON    THE    MARCH. 


CHAPTER   XLII. 

THE  CRUSADES. 

(1096-1272.) 
1 .   Introductory  :    Causes  of  the  Crusades. 

General  Statement. — The  Crusades  were  great  military  expedi- 
tions undertaken  by  the  Christian  nations  of  Europe  for  the  pur- 
pose of  rescuing  from  the  hands  of  the  Mohammedans  the  holy 
places  of  Palestine.  They  were  eight  in  number,  the  first  four 
being  sometimes  called  the  Principal  Crusades,  and  the  remaining 
four  the  Minor  Crusades.  Besides  these  there  were  a  Children's 
Crusade,  and  several  other  expeditions,  which,  being  insignificant 
in  numbers  or  results,  are  not  usually  enumerated. 

Causes  of  the  Crusades. — Among  the  early  Christians  it  was 
thought  a  pious  and  meritorious  act  to  undertake   a  journey  to 


PETER    THE  HERMIT.  439 

some  sacred  place.  Especially  was  it.  thought  that  a  pilgrimage 
to  the  land  that  had  been  trod  by  the  feet  of  the  Saviour  of  the 
world,  to  the  Holy  City  that  had  witnessed  his  martyrdom,  was  a 
peculiarly  pious  undertaking,  and  one  which  secured  for  the  pil- 
grim the  special  favor  and  blessing  of  Heaven. 

The  Saracen  caliphs,  for  the  four  centuries  and  more  that  they 
held  possession  of  Palestine,  pursued  usually  an  enlightened  policy 
towards  the  pilgrims,  even  encouraging  pilgrimages  as  a  source  of 
revenue.  But  in  the  eleventh  century  the  Seljukian  Turks,  a 
prominent  Tartar  tribe,  zealous  proselytes  of  Islam,  wrested  from 
the  caliphs  almost  all  their  Asiatic  possessions.  The  Christians 
were  not  long  in  realizing  that  power  had  fallen  into  new  hands. 
Pilgrims  were  insulted  and  persecuted  in  every  way.  The  churches 
in  Jerusalem  were  destroyed  or  turned  into  stables. 

Now,  if  it  were  a  meritorious  thing  to  make  a  pilgrimage  to  the 
Holy  Sepulchre,  much  more  would  it  be  a  pious  act  to  rescue  the 
sacred  spot  from  the  profanation  of  infidels.  This  was  the  convic- 
tion that  changed  the  pilgrim  into  a  warrior,  —  this  the  sentiment 
that  for  two  centuries  and  more  stirred  the  Christian  world  to  its 
profoundest  depths,  and  cast  the  population  of  Europe  in  wave 
after  wave  upon  Asia. 

Although  this  religious  feeling  was  the  principal  cause  of  the 
Crusades,  still  there  was  another  concurring  cause  which  must  not 
be  overlooked.  This  was  the  restless,  adventurous  spirit  of  the 
Teutonic  peoples  of  Europe,  who  had  not  as  yet  outgrown  their 
barbarian  instincts.  The  feudal  knights  and  lords,  just  now  ani- 
mated by  the  rising  spirit  of  chivalry,  were  very  ready  to  enlist  in 
an  undertaking  so  consonant  with  their  martial  feelings  and  their 
new  vows  of  knighthood. 

Preaching  of  Peter  the  Hermit.  — The  immediate  cause  of  the 
First  Crusade  was  the  preaching  of  Peter  the  Hermit,  a  native  of 
Picardy,  in  France.  Having  been  commissioned  by  Pope  Urban 
II.  to  preach  a  crusade,  the  Hermit  traversed  all  Italy  and  France, 
addressing  everywhere,  in  the  church,  in  the  street,  and  in  the 
open  field,  the  crowds  that  flocked  about  him,  moving  all  hearts 


440  CAUSES   OF  THE   CRUSADES. 

with  sympathy  or  firing  them  with  indignation,  as  he  recited  the 
sufferings  of  their  brethren  at  the  hands  of  the  infidels,  or  pictured 
the  profanation  of  the  holy  places,  polluted  by  the  presence  and 
insults  of  the  unbelievers. 

The  Councils  of  Placentia  and  Clermont.  —  While  Peter  the 
Hermit  had  been  arousing  the  warriors  of  the  West,  the  Turks  had 
been  making  constant  advances  in  the  East,  and  were  now  threat- 
ening Constantinople  itself.  The  Greek  emperor  (Alexius  Com- 
nenus)  sent  urgent  letters  to  the  Pope,  asking  for  aid  against  the 
infidels,  representing  that,  unless  assistance  was  extended  immedi- 
ately, the  capital  with  all  its  holy  relics  must  soon  fall  into  the 
hands  of  the  barbarians. 

Urban  called  a  great  council  of  the  Church  at  Placentia,  in 
Italy,  to  consider  the  appeal  (1095),  but  nothing  was  effected. 
Later  in  the  same  year  a  new  council  was  convened  at  Clermont, 
in  France,  Urban  purposely  fixing  the  place  of  meeting  among  the 
warm-tempered  and  martial  Franks.  The  Pope  himself  was  one 
of  the  chief  speakers.  He  was  naturally  eloquent,  so  that  the  man, 
the  cause,  and  the  occasion  all  conspired  to  achieve  one  of  the 
greatest  triumphs  of  human  oratory.  He  pictured  the  humiliation 
and  misery  of  the  provinces  of  Asia ;  the  profanation  of  the  places 
made  sacred  by  the  presence  and  footsteps  of  the  Son  of  God ; 
and  then  he  detailed  the  conquests  of  the  Turks,  until  now,  with 
all  Asia  Minor  in  their  possession,  they  were  threatening  Europe 
from  the  shores  of  the  Hellespont.  "  When  Jesus  Christ  summons 
you  to  his  defence,"  exclaimed  the  eloquent  pontiff,  "  let  no  base 
affection  detain  you  in  your  homes  ;  whoever  will  abandon  his 
house,  or  his  father,  or  his  mother,  or  his  wife,  or  his  children,  or 
his  inheritance,  for  the  sake  of  my  name,  shall  be  recompensed  a 
hundred- fold,  and  possess  life  eternal." 

Here  the  enthusiasm  of  the  vast  assembly  burst  through  every 
restraint.  With  one  voice  they  cried,  Dieu  k  volt!  Dieu  le  volt! 
"  It  is  the  will  of  God  !  It  is  the  will  of  God  ! "  Thousands 
immediately  affixed  the  cross  to  their  garments,1  as  a  pledge  of 

1  Hence  the  name  Crusade  given  to  the  Holy  Wars,  from  old  French  crois, 
cross. 


MUSTERING   OF  THE   CRUSADERS.  441 

their  sacred  engagement  to  go  forth  to  the  rescue  of  the  Holy 
Sepulchre.  The  fifteenth  day  of  August  of  the  following  year  was 
set  for  the  departure  of  the  expedition. 

2.  The  First  Crusade  (109 6- 1099). 

Mustering  of  the  Crusaders.  —  All  Western  Europe  now  rang 
with  the  cry, "  He  who  will  not  take  up  his  cross  and  follow  me, 
is  not  worthy  of  me."  The  contagion  of  enthusiasm  seized  all 
classes ;  for  while  the  religious  feelings  of  the  age  had  been  spe- 
cially appealed  to,  all  the  various  sentiments  of  ambition,  chivalry, 
love  of  license,  had  also  been  skilfully  enlisted  on  the  side  of  the 
undertaking.  The  council  of  Clermont  had  declared  Europe  to  be 
in  a  state  of  peace,  and  pronounced  anathemas  against  any  one 
who  should  invade  the  possessions  of  a  prince  engaged  in  the  holy 
war.  By  further  edicts  of  the  assembly,  the  debtor  was  released 
from  meeting  his  obligations  while  a  soldier  of  the  Cross,  and  dur- 
ing this  period  the  interest  on  his  debt  was  to  cease ;  and  the 
criminal,  as  soon  as  he  assumed  the  badge  of  the  crusader,  was 
by  that  act  instantly  absolved  from  all  his  sins  of  whatever  nature. 

Under  such  inducements  princes  and  nobles,  bishops  and 
priests,  monks  and  anchorites,  saints  and  sinners,  rich  and  poor, 
hastened  to  enroll  themselves  beneath  the  consecrated  banner. 
"  Europe,"  says  Michaud,  "  appeared  to  be  a  land  of  exile,  which 
every  one  was  eager  to  quit." 

The  Vanguard.  —  Before  the  regular  armies  of  the  crusaders 
were  ready  to  move,  those  who  had  gathered  about  Peter  the 
Hermit,  becoming  impatient  of  delay,  urged  him  to  place  himself 
at  their  head  and  lead  them  at  once  to  the  Holy  Land.  Dividing 
command  of  the  mixed  multitudes  with  a  poor  knight,  called 
Walter  the  Penniless,  and  followed  by  a  throng  of  about  80,000 
persons,  among  whom  were  many  women  and  children,  the  Hermit 
set  out  for  Constantinople  by  the  overland  route  through  Germany 
and  Hungary.  Thousands  of  the  crusaders  fell  in  battle  with  the 
natives  of  the  countries  through  which  they  marched,  and  thou- 


442  THE  FIRST   CRUSADE. 

sands  more  perished  miserably  of  hunger  and  exposure.  Those 
that  crossed  the  Bosporus  were  surprised  by  the  Turks,  and 
almost  all  were  slaughtered.  Thus  perished  the  forlorn  hope  of 
the  First  Crusade. 

March,  of  the  Main  Body.  —  Meanwhile  there  were  gathering  in 
the  West  disciplined  armies  composed  of  men  worthy  to  be 
champions  of  the  holy  cause  they  had  espoused.  Godfrey  of 
Bouillon,  Duke  of  Lorraine,  and  Tancred,  "  the  mirror  of  knight- 
hood," were  among  the  most  noted  of  the  leaders  of  the  different 
divisions  of  the  army.  The  expedition  numbered  about  700,000 
men,  of  whom  fully  100,000  were  mailed  knights. 

The  crusaders  traversed  Europe  by  different  routes  and  re- 
assembled at  Constantinople.  Crossing  the  Bosporus,  they  first 
captured  Nicsea,  the  Turkish  capital,  in  Bithynia,  and  then  set  out 
across  Asia  Minor  for  Syria.  The  line  of  their  dreary  march 
between  Nicaea  and  Antioch  was  whitened  with  the  bones  of 
nearly  one-half  their  number.  Arriving  at  Antioch,  the  surviv- 
ors captured  that  place,  and  then,  after  some  delays,  pushed  on 
towards  Jerusalem. 

When  at  length  the  Holy  City  burst  upon  their  view,  a  perfect 
delirium  of  joy  seized  the  crusaders.  They  embraced  one  another 
with  tears  of  joy,  and  even  embraced  and  kissed  the  ground  on 
which  they  stood.  As  they  passed  on,  they  took  off  their  shoes, 
and  marched  with  uncovered  head  and  bare  feet,  singing  the  words 
of  the  prophet:  "Jerusalem,  lift  up  thine  eyes,  and  behold  the 
liberator  who  comes  to  break  thy  chains." 

The  first  assault  made  by  the  Christians  upon  the  walls  of  the 
city  was  repulsed ;  but  the  second  was  successful,  and  the  city  was 
in  the  hands  of  the  crusaders  (1099).  A  terrible  slaughter  of  the 
infidels  now  took  place.  For  seven  days  the  carnage  went  on,  at 
the  end  of  which  time  scarcely  any  of  the  Moslem  faith  were  left 
alive.  The  Christians  took  possession  of  the  houses  and  property 
of  the  infidels,  each  soldier  having  a  right  to  that  which  he  had 
first  seized  and  placed  his  mark  upon. 

Founding  of  the  Latin  Kingdom  of  Jerusalem.  —  No  sooner 


RELIGIOUS   ORDERS   OF  KNIGHTHOOD.  443 

was  Jerusalem  in  the  hands  of  the  crusaders  than  they  set  them- 
selves to  the  task  of  organizing  a  government  for  the  city  and 
country  they  had  conquered.  The  government  which  they  estab- 
lished was  a  sort  of  feudal  league,  known  as  the  Latin  Kingdom  of 
Jerusalem.  At  its  head  was  placed  Godfrey  of  Bouillon,  the  most 
valiant  and  devoted  of  the  crusader  knights.  The  prince  refused 
the  title  and  vestments  of  royalty,  declaring  that  he  would  never 
wear  a  crown  of  gold  in  the  city  where  his  Lord  and  Master  had 
worn  a  crown  of  thorns.  The  only  title  he  would  accept  was  that 
of  "  Defender  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre." 

Many  of  the  crusaders,  considering  their  vows  fulfilled,  now  set 
out  on  their  return  to  their  homes,  some  making  their  way  back 
by  sea  and  some  by  land.  Godfrey,  Tancred,  and  a  few  hundred 
other  knights,  were  all  that  stayed  behind  to  maintain  the  con- 
quests that  had  been  made,  and  to  act  as  guardians  of  the  holy 
places. 

3.  The  Second  Crusade  (1147-1149). 

Origin  of  the  Religious  Orders  of  Knighthood.  —  In  the  inter- 
val between  the  Second  and  the  Third  Crusade,  the  two  famed 
religious  military  orders,  known  as  the  Hospitallers  and  the  Tem- 
plars,' were  formed.  A  little  later,  during  the  Third  Crusade,  still 
another  fraternity,  known  as  the  Teutonic  Knights  was  established. 
The  objects  of  all  the  orders  were  the  care  of  the  sick  and 
wounded  crusaders,  the  entertainment  of  Christian  pilgrims,  the 
guarding  of  the  holy  places,  and  ceaseless  battling  for  the  Cross. 
These  fraternities  soon  acquired  a  military  fame  that  was  spread 
throughout  the  Christian  world.  They  were  joined  by  many  of 
the  most  illustrious  knights  of  the  West,  and  through  the  gifts  of 

1  The  Hospitallers,  or  Knights  of  St.  John,  took  their  name  from  the  fact 
that  the  organization  was  first  formed  among  the  monks  of  the  Hospital  of 
St.  John,  at  Jerusalem;  while  the  Templars,  or  Knights  of  the  Temple,  were 
so  called  on  account  of  one  of  the  buildings  of  the  brotherhood  occupying 
the  site  of  Solomon's  Temple. 


444  SECOND  AND    THIRD    CRUSADES. 

the  pious  acquired  great  wealth,  and  became  possessed  of  numer- 
ous estates  and  castles  in  Europe  as  well  as  in  Asia. 

Preaching  of  St.  Bernard ;  Failure  of  the  Crusade.  —  In  the 
year  1 146,  the  city  of  Edessa,  the  bulwark  ol  the  Latin  Kingdom 
of  Jerusalem  on  the  side  towards  Mesopotamia,  was  taken  by  the 
Turks,  and  the  entire  population  was  slaughtered,  or  sold  into 
slavery.  This  disaster  threw  the  entire  West  into  a  state  of  the 
greatest  alarm,  lest  the  little  Christian  state,  established  at  such 
cost  of  tears  and  suffering,  should  be  completely  overwhelmed, 
and  all  the  holy  places  should  again  fall  into  the  hands  of  the 
infidels. 

The  scenes  that  marked  the  opening  of  the  First  Crusade  were 
now  repeated  in  all  the  countries  of  the  West.  St.  Bernard,  an 
eloquent  monk,  was  the  second  Peter  the  Hermit,  who  went  every- 
where, arousing  the  warriors  of  the  Cross  to  the  defence  of  the 
birthplace  of  their  religion.  The  contagion  of  the  holy  enthusiasm 
seized  not  only  barons,  knights,  and  the  common  people,  which 
classes  alone  participated  in  the  First  Crusade,  but  kings  and 
emperors  were  now  infected  with  the  sacred  frenzy.  Conrad  III., 
emperor  of  Germany,  was  persuaded  to  leave  the  affairs  of  his 
distracted  empire  in  the  hands  of  God,  and  consecrate  himself  to 
the  defence  of  the  sepulchre  of  Christ.  Louis  VII.,  king  of 
France,  was  led  to  undertake  the  crusade  through  remorse  for  an 
act  of  great  cruelty  that  he  had  perpetrated  upon  some  of  his 
revolted  subjects.1 

The  strength  of  both  the  French  and  the  German  division  of 
the  expedition  was  wasted  in  Asia  Minor,  and  the  crusade  accom- 
plished nothing. 

4.  The  Third  Crusade  (1189-1192). 

The  Three  Leaders.  —  The  Third  Crusade  was  caused  by  the 
capture  of  Jerusalem   (1187)   by  Saladin,  the  sultan  of  Egypt. 

1  The  act  which  troubled  the  king's  conscience  was  the  burning  of  thirteen 
hundred  people  in  a  church,  whither  they  had  fled  for  refuge. 


DEATH  OF  FREDERICK  BARBAROSSA.  445 

Three  of  the  great  sovereigns  of  Europe,  Frederick  Barbarossa  of 
Germany,  Philip  Augustus  of  France,  and  Richard  I.  of  England, 
assumed  the  Cross,  and  set  out,  each  at  the  head  of  a  large  army, 
for  the  recovery  of  the  Holy  City. 

The  English  king,  Richard,  afterwards  given  the  title  of  Coeur 
de  Lion,  the  "  Lion-hearted,"  in  memory  of  his  heroic  exploits  in 
Palestine,  was  the  central  figure  among  the  Christian  knights  of 
this  crusade.  He  raised  money  for  the  enterprise  by  the  perse- 
cution and  robbery  of  the  Jews ;  by  the  imposition  of  an  unusual 
tax  upon  all  classes ;  and  by  the  sale  of  offices,  dignities,  and  the 
royal  lands.  When  some  one  expostulated  with  him  on  the  means 
employed  to  raise  money,  he  declared  that  "  he  would  sell  the  city 
of  London,  if  he  could  find  a  purchaser." 

Death  of  Frederick  Barbarossa :  Siege  of  Acre.  —  The  Ger- 
man army,  attempting  the  overland  route,  was  consumed  in  Asia 
Minor  by  the  hardships  of  the  march  and  the  swords  of  the  Turks. 
The  Emperor  Frederick,  according  to  the  most  probable  accounts, 
was  drowned  while  crossing  a  swollen  stream,  and  the  most  of  the 
survivors  of  his  army,  disheartened  by  the  loss  of  their  leader, 
returned  to  Germany. 

The  English  and  French  kings  finally  mustered  their  forces 
beneath  the  walls  of  Acre,  which  city  the  Christians  were  then 
besieging.  It  is  estimated  that  600,000  men  were  engaged  in  the 
investment  of  the  place.  After  one  of  the  longest  and  most  costly 
sieges  they  ever  carried  on  in  Asia,  the  crusaders  at  last  forced 
the  place  to  capitulate,  in  spite  of  all  the  efforts  of  Saladin  to  ren- 
der the  garrison  relief. 

Richard  and  Saladin.  —  The  knightly  adventures  and  chival- 
rous exploits  which  mark  the  career  of  Richard  in  the  Holy  Land 
read  like  a  romance.  Nor  was  the  chief  of  the  Mohammedans, 
the  renowned  Saladin,  lacking  in  any  of  those  knightly  virtues 
with  which  the  writers  of  the  time  invested  the  character  of  the 
English  hero.  At  one  time,  when  Richard  was  sick  with  a  fever, 
Saladin,  knowing  that  he  was  poorly  supplied  with  delicacies,  sent 
him  a  gift  of  the  choicest  fruits  of  the  land.     And  on  another 


446  THE  FOURTH  CRUSADE. 

occasion,  Richard's  horse  having  been  killed  in  battle,  the  sultan 
caused  a  fine  Arabian  steed  to  be  led  to  the  Christian  camp  as  a 
present  for  his  rival. 

For  two  years  did  Richard  the  Lion-hearted  vainly  contend  in 
almost  daily  combat  with  his  generous  antagonist  for  the  posses- 
sion of  the  tomb  of  Christ.  He  finally  concluded  a  truce  of  three 
years  and  eight  months  with  Saladin,  which  provided  that  the 
Christians  during  that  period  should  have  free  access  to  the  holy 
places,  and  remain  in  undisturbed  possession  of  the  coast  from 
Jaffa  to  Tyre. 

5.  The  Fourth   Crusade  (i  202-1 204). 

Capture  of  Constantinople  by  the  Latins.  —  None  of  the  Cru- 
sades after  the  Third  effected  much  in  the  Holy  Land ;  either 
their  force  was  spent  before  reaching  it,  or  they  were  diverted  from 
their  purpose  by  different  objects  and  ambitions. 

The  crusaders  of  the  Fourth  expedition  captured  Constantino- 
ple instead  of  Jerusalem.  The  circumstances  were  these  :  A  usur- 
per had  seized  upon  the  Byzantine  throne.  The  rightful  claimant, 
Alexius,  besought  the  aid  of  the  Frankish  warriors  to  regain  the 
sceptre.  The  Christian  knights  listened  favorably  to  his  appeals. 
The  Venetians,  in  consideration  of  a  share  of  the  conquests  that 
might  be  made,  also  joined  their  forces  to  those  of  the  crusaders. 
Constantinople  was  taken  by  storm,  and  Alexius  was  invested 
with  the  Imperial  authority. 

Scarcely  was  Alexius  seated  upon  the  throne,  before  the  turbu- 
lent Greeks  engaged  in  a  revolt  which  resulted  in  his  death.  The 
crusaders  now  resolved  to  take  possession  of  the  capital,  and 
set  a  Latin  prince  on  the  throne  of  Constantine.  The  determina- 
tion was  carried  out.  Constantinople  was  taken  a  second  time  by 
storm,  and  sacked,  and  Baldwin,  Count  of  Flanders,  was  crowned 
Emperor  of  the  East. 

The  Latin  empire  thus  established  lasted  only  a  little  over  half 
a  century  (1 204-1 261).     The  Greeks,  at  the  end  of  this  period, 


THE    CHILDREN'S   CRUSADE.  447 

succeeded  in  regaining  the  throne,  which  they  then  held  until  the 
capture  of  Constantinople  by  the  Turks  in  1453. 

6.   Close  of  the  Crusades  :  Their  Results. 

The  Children's  Crusade  (1212).  —  During  the  interval  between 
the  Fourth  and  the  Fifth  Crusade,  the  epidemical  fanaticism  that 
had  so  long  agitated  Europe  seized  upon  the  children,  resulting  in 
what  is  known  as  the  Children's  Crusade. 

The  preacher  of  this  crusade  was  a  child  about  twelve  years  of 
age,  a  French  peasant  lad,  named  Stephen,  who  became  persuaded 
that  Jesus  Christ  had  commanded  him  to  lead  a  crusade  of  chil- 
dren to  the  rescue  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre.  The  children  became 
wild  with  excitement,  and  flocked  in  vast  crowds  to  the  places 
appointed  for  rendezvous.  Nothing  could  restrain  them  or  thwart 
their  purpose.  "  Even  bolts  and  bars,"  says  an  old  chronicler, 
"  could  not  hold  them." 

The  movement  excited  the  most  diverse  views.  Some  declared 
that  it  was  inspired  by  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  quoted  such  Scriptural 
texts  as  these  to  justify  the  enthusiasm  :  "  A  child  shall  lead 
them  ; "  "  Out  of  the  mouth  of  babes  and  sucklings  thou  hast 
ordained  praise."  Others,  however,  were  quite  as  confident  that 
the  whole  thing  was  the  work  of  the  Devil. 

The  great  majority  of  those  who  collected  at  the  rallying  places 
were  boys  under  twelve  years  of  age,  but  there  were  also  many 
girls.  The  German  children,  50,000  in  number,  crossed  the  Alps, 
and  marched  down  the  Italian  shores,  looking  for  a  miraculous 
pathway  through  the  Mediterranean.  From  Brundusium  2000  or 
3000  of  the  little  crusaders  sailed  away  into  oblivion.  Not  a 
word  ever  came  back  from  them. 

The  French  children  —  about  30,000  in  number  —  set  out  from 
the  place  of  rendezvous  for  Marseilles.  Those  that  sailed  from 
that  port  were  betrayed,  and  sold  as  slaves  in  Alexandria  and 
other  Mohammedan  slave  markets. 

This  remarkable  spectacle  of  the  children's  crusade  affords  the 


448  CLOSE   OF  THE    CRUSADES, 

most  striking  exhibition  possible  of  the  ignorance,  superstition, 
and  fanaticism  that  characterized  the  period.  Yet  we  cannot  but 
reverence  the  holy  enthusiasm  of  an  age  that  could  make  such 
sacrifices  of  innocence  and  helplessness  in  obedience  to  what  was 
believed  to  be  the  will  of  God. 

The  children's  expedition  marked  at  once  the  culmination  and 
the  decline  of  the  crusading  movement.  The  fanatic  zeal  that 
inspired  the  first  crusaders  was  already  dying  out.  "  These  chil- 
dren," said  the  Pope,  referring  to  the  young  crusaders,  "  reproach 
us  with  having  fallen  asleep,  whilst  they  were  flying  to  the  assist- 
ance of  the  Holy  Land." 

The  Minor  Crusades:  End  of  the  Kingdom  of  Jerusalem. — 
The  last  four  expeditions  —  the  Fifth,  Sixth,  Seventh,  and  Eighth 
—  undertaken  by  the  Christians  of  Europe  against  the  infidels  of 
the  East,  may  be  conveniently  grouped  as  the  Minor  Crusades. 
They  were  marked  by  a  less  fervid  and  holy  enthusiasm  than  that 
which  characterized  the  first  movements,  and  exhibit  among  those 
taking  part  in  them  the  greatest  variety  of  objects  and  ambitions.1 
The  flame  of  the  Crusades  had  burned  itself  out,  and  the  fate 
of  the  little  Christian  kingdom  in  Asia,  isolated  from  Europe, 
and  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  bitter  enemies,  became  each 
day  more  and  more  apparent.      Finally  the   last  of  the  places 

1  The  Fifth  Crusade  (1216-1220)  was  led  by  the  kings  of  Hungary  and 
Cyprus.  Its  strength  was  wasted  in  Egypt,  and  it  resulted  in  nothing.  The 
Sixth  Crusade  ( 1 227-1229),  headed  by  Frederick  II.  of  Germany,  succeeded 
in  securing  from  the  Saracens  the  restoration  of  Jerusalem,  together  with  sev- 
eral other  cities  of  Palestine.  The  Seventh  Crusade  ( 1 249-1 254)  was  under 
the  lead  of  Louis  IX.  of  France,  surnamed  the  Saint.  The  Eighth  Crusade 
( 1 270-1 272)  was  incited  by  the  fresh  misfortunes  that,  towards  the  close  of 
the  thirteenth  century,  befell  the  Christian  kingdom  in  Palestine.  The  two 
principal  leaders  of  the  expedition  were  Louis  IX.  of  France,  and  Prince 
Edward  of  England,  afterwards  Edward  I.  Louis  directed  his  forces  against 
the  Moors  about  Tunis,  in  North  Africa.  Here  the  king  died  of  the  plague. 
Nothing  was  effected  by  this  division  of  the  expedition.  The  division  led  by 
the  English  prince,  was,  however,  more  fortunate.  Edward  succeeded  in  cap- 
turing Nazareth,  and  in  compelling  the  sultan  of  Egypt  to  agree  to  a  treaty 
favorable  to  the  Christians  (1272). 


RESULTS   OF  THE   CRUSADES.  449 

(Acre)  held  by  the  Christians  fell  before  the  attacks  of  the  Mame- 
lukes of  Egypt,  and  with  this  event  the  Latin  Kingdom  of  Jerusalem 
came  to  an  end  (1291).  The  second  great  combat  between 
Mohammedanism  and  Christianity  was  over,  and  "  silence  reigned 
along  the  shore  that  had  so  long  resounded  with  the  world's 
debate." 

Results  of  the  Crusades.  —  The  Crusades  kept  all  Europe  in  a 
tumult  for  two  centuries,  and  directly  and  indirectly  cost  Christen- 
dom several  millions  of  lives  (from  2,000,000  to  6,000,000  accord- 
ing to  different  estimates),  besides  incalculable  expenditures  in 
treasure  and  suffering.  They  were,  moreover,  attended  by  all  the 
disorder,  license,  and  crime  with  which  war  is  always  accompa- 
nied. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Holy  Wars  were  productive  indirectly  of 
so  much  and  lasting  good  that  they  form  a  most  important  factor 
in  the  history  of  the  progress  of  civilization.  To  show  this  to  be 
so,  we  will  speak  briefly  of  their  influence  upon  the  Church,  and 
upon  the  political,  the  social,  the  intellectual,  and  the  material 
progress  and  development  of  the  European  nations. 

The  Crusades  contributed  to  increase  the  wealth  of  the  Church 
and  the  power  of  the  Papacy.  Thus  the  prominent  part  which  the 
Popes  took  in  the  enterprises  naturally  fostered  their  authority  and 
influence,  by  placing  in  their  hands,  as  it  were,  the  armies  and 
resources  of  Christendom,  and  accustoming  the  people  to  look  to 
them  as  guides  and  leaders.  As  to  the  wealth  of  the  churches  and 
monasteries,  this  was  augmented  enormously  by  the  sale  to  them, 
often  for  a  mere  fraction  of  their  actual  value,  of  the  estates  of 
those  preparing  for  the  expeditions,  or  by  the  out  and  out  gift  of 
the  lands  of  such  in  return  for  prayers  and  pious  benedictions. 
Again,  thousands  of  the  crusaders,  returning  broken  in  spirits  and 
in  health,  sought  an  asylum  in  cloistral  retreats,  and  endowed  the 
establishments  that  they  entered  with  all  their  worldly  goods.  Be- 
sides all  this,  the  stream  of  the  ordinary  gifts  of  piety  was  swollen 
by  the  extraordinary  fervor  of  religious  enthusiasm  which  charac- 
terized the  period  into  enormous  proportions.     In  all  these  ways, 


450  CLOSE    OF   THE    CRUSADES. 

the  power  of  the  Papacy  and  the  wealth  of  the  Church  were 
vastly  augmented.1 

As  to  the  political  effects  of  the  Crusades,  they  helped  to  break 
down  the  power  of  the  feudal  aristocracy,  and  to  give  prominence 
to  the  kings  and  the  people.  Many  of  the  nobles  who  set  out  on 
the  expeditions  never  returned,  and  their  estates,  through  failure 
of  heirs,  escheated  to  the  Crown ;  while  many  more  wasted  their 
fortunes  in  meeting  the  expenses  of  their  undertaking.  At  the 
same  time,  the  cities  also  gained  many  political  advantages  at  the 
expense  of  the  crusading  barons  and  princes.  Ready  money  in 
the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  was  largely  in  the  hands  of  the 
burgher  class,  and  in  return  for  the  contributions  and  loans  they 
made  to  their  overlords,  or  suzerains,  they  received  charters  con- 
ferring special  and  valuable  privileges.  And  under  this  head  of 
the  political  effects  of  the  Crusades,  it  should  be  noticed  that,  in 
checking  the  advance  of  the  Turks,  they  postponed  the  fall  of 
Constantinople  for  three  centuries  or  more.  This  gave  the  young 
Christian  civilization  of  Germany  time  to  acquire  sufficient  strength 
to  roll  back  the  returning  tide  of  Mohammedan  invasion  when  it 
broke  upon  Europe  in  the  fifteenth  century. 

The  effects  of  the  Crusades  upon  the  social  life  of  the  Western 
nations  were  marked  and  important.  Giving  opportunity  for 
romantic  adventure,  they  were  one  of  the  principal  fostering  influ- 
ences of  Chivalry  ;  while  by  bringing  the  rude  peoples  of  the  West 
in  contact  with  the  culture  of  the  East,  they  exerted  upon  them  a 
general  refining  influence. 

The  influence  of  the  Crusades  upon  the  intellectual  development 
of  Europe  can  hardly  be  overestimated.  Above  all,  they  liberal- 
ized the  minds  of  the  crusaders.  Furthermore,  the  knowledge  of 
the  science  and  learning  of  the  East  gained   by   the    crusaders 

1  It  should  be  said  in  regard  to  this  increase  in  the  riches  of  the  Church  and 
the  authority  of  the  Popes,  that  while  Catholics  count  this  as  one  of  the  good 
results  of  the  Holy  Wars,  Protestants  consider  it  as  one  of  the  evils  of  the 
movements,  urging  that  it  led  to  papal  tyranny  and  to  the  corruption  of 
monastic  morals. 


RESULTS   OF   THE    CRUSADES.  451 

through  their  expeditions,  greatly  stimulated  the  Latin  intellect, 
and  helped  to  awaken  in  Western  Europe  that  mental  activity 
which  resulted  finally  in  the  great  intellectual  outburst  known 
as  the  Revival  of  Learning  (see  p.  471). 

Among  the  effects  of  the  Holy  Wars  upon  the  material  develop- 
ment of  Europe  must  be  mentioned  the  spur  they  gave  to  com- 
mercial enterprise,  especially  to  the  trade  and  commerce  of  the 
Italian  cities.  During  this  period,  Venice,  Pisa,  and  Genoa  ac- 
quired great  wealth  and  reputation  through  the  fostering  of  their 
trade  by  the  needs  of  the  crusaders,  and  the  opening  up  of  the 
East.  The  Mediterranean  was  whitened  with  the  sails  of  their 
transport  ships,  which  were  constantly  plying  between  the  various 
ports  of  Europe  and  the  towns  of  the  Syrian  coast.  Moreover, 
various  arts,  manufactures,  and  inventions  before  unknown  in 
Europe,  were  introduced  from  Asia.  This  enrichment  of  the  civil- 
ization of  the  West  with  the  "  spoils  of  the  East "  we  may  allow 
to  be  emblemized  by  the  famous  bronze  horses  that  the  crusaders 
carried  off  from  Constantinople,  and  set  up  before  St.  Mark's 
Cathedral  in  Venice. 

Lastly,  the  incentive  given  to  geographical  discovery  led  various 
travellers,  such  as  the  celebrated  Italian,  Marco  Polo,  and  the 
scarcely  less  noted  Englishman,  Sir  John  Mandeville,  to  explore 
the  most  remote  countries  of  Asia.  Even  that  spirit  of  maritime 
enterprise  and  adventure  which  rendered  illustrious  the  fifteenth 
century,  inspiring  the  voyages  of  Columbus,  Vasco  de  Gama,  and 
Magellan,  may  be  traced  back  to  that  lively  interest  in  geographi- 
cal matters  awakened  by  the  expeditions  of  the  crusaders. 


452  SUPREMACY  OF  THE  PAPACY. 


CHAPTER    XLIII.    # 

SUPREMACY  OF  THE  PAPACY:    DECLINE  OF  ITS  TEMPORAL 

POWER. 

Introductory.  —  In  a  previous  chapter  we  traced  the  gradual  rise 
of  the  spiritual  and  temporal  power  of  the  Papacy,  and  stated  the 
several  theories  respecting  its  relation  to  secular  rulers.  In  the 
present  chapter,  we  purpose  to  follow  its  increasing  power  to  the 
culmination  of  its  authority  in  the  thirteenth  century,  and  then  to 
speak  of  some  of  the  circumstances  that  caused,  or  that  marked, 
the  decline  of  its  temporal  power. 

Pope  Gregory  VII.  (Hildebrand)  and  his  Reforms.  —  One  of 
the  greatest  promoters  of  the  papal  fortunes  was  Pope  Gregory 
VII.,  perhaps  better  known  as  Hildebrand,  the  most  noteworthy 
character  after  Charlemagne  that  the  Middle  Ages  produced. 
In  the  year  1049  he  was  called  from  the  cloisters  of  a  French 
monastery  to  Rome,  there  to  become  the  maker  and  adviser  of 
Popes,  and  finally  to  be  himself  elevated  to  the  pontifical  throne, 
which  he  held  from  1073  to  1080.  Being  a  man  of  great  force 
of  character  and  magnificent  breadth  of  view,  he  did  much 
towards  establishing  the  universal  spiritual  and  temporal  sovereignty 
of  the  Holy  See. 

In  carrying  out  his  purpose  of  exalting  the  Papal  See  above  all 
prelates  and  princes,  Gregory,  as  soon  as  he  became  Pope,  set 
about  two  important  reforms,  —  the  enforcement  of  celibacy  among 
the  secular  clergy,  and  the  suppression  of  simony.  By  the  first 
measure  he  aimed  to  effect  not  only  a  much-needed  moral  reform, 
but,  by  separating  the  clergy  from  all  the  attachments  of  home 
and  neighborhood  and  country,  to  render  them  more  devoted  to 
the  interests  of  the  Church. 


POPE   GREGORY   VII  453 

The  second  reform,  the  correction  of  simony,  had  for  its  ulti- 
mate object  the  freeing  of  the  lands  and  offices  of  the  Church 
from  the  control  of  temporal  lords  and  princes,  and  the  bringing 
of  them  more  completely  into  the  hands  of  the  Roman  bishop. 

The  evil  of  simony  l  had  grown  up  in  the  Church  in  the  follow- 
ing way :  As  the  feudal  system  took  possession  of  European  soci- 
ety, the  Church,  like  individuals  and  cities,  assumed  feudal  relations. 
Thus,  as  we  have  already  seen,  abbots  and  bishops,  as  the  heads  of 
monasteries  and  churches,  for  the  sake  of  protection,  became  the 
vassals  of  powerful  barons  or  princes.  When  once  a  prelate  had 
rendered  homage  for  his  estates,  or  temporalities,  as  they  were 
called,  these  became  thenceforth  a  permanent  fief  of  the  overlord, 
and  upon  the  death  of  the  holder  could  be  re-bestowed  by  the  lord 
upon  whomsoever  he  chose.  These  Church  estates  and  positions 
that  thus  came  within  the  gift  of  the  temporal  princes  were  often 
given  to  unworthy  court  favorites,  or  sold  to  the  highest  bidder. 
So  long  as  a  considerable  portion  of  the  clergy  sustained  this  vas- 
sal relation  to  the  feudal  lords,  the  Papal  See  could  not  hope  to 
exercise  any  great  authority  over  them. 

To  remedy  the  evil,  Gregory  issued  a  decree  that  no  ecclesias- 
tic should  do  homage  to  a  temporal  lord,  but  that  he  should 
receive  the  ring  and  staff,  the  symbols  of  investiture,  from  the 
hands  of  the  Pope  alone.  Any  one  who  should  dare  disobey  the 
decree  was  threatened  with  the  anathemas  of  the  Church. 

Such  was  the  bold  measure  by  which  Gregory  proposed  to  wrest 
out  of  the  hands  of  the  feudal  lords  and  princes  the  vast  patron- 
age and  immense  revenues  resulting  from  the  relation  they  had 
gradually  come  to  sustain  to  a  large  portion  of  the  lands  and  riches 
of  the  Church.  To  realize  the  magnitude  of  the  proposed  revolu- 
tion, we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the  Church  at  this  time  was  in 
possession  of  probably  one-half  of  the  lands  of  Europe. 

Excommunications    and    Interdicts.  —  The   principal  instru- 

1  By  simony  is  meant  the  purchase  of  an  office  in  the  Church,  the  name  of 
the  offence  coming  from  Simon  Magus,  who  offered  Paul  money  for  the  gift  of 
curing  diseases. 


454  SUPREMACY  OF  THE  PAPACY. 

ments  relied  upon  by  Gregory  for  the  carrying  out  of  his  re- 
forms were  Excommunication  and  Interdict. 

The  first  was  directed  against  individuals.  The  person  excom- 
municated was  cut  off  from  all  relations  with  his  fellow-men.  If  a 
king,  his  subjects  were  released  from  their  oath  of  allegiance. 
Any  one  providing  the  accursed  with  food  or  shelter  incurred  the 
wrath  of  the  Church.  The  Interdict  was  directed  against  a  city, 
province,  or  kingdom.  Throughout  the  region  under  this  ban,  the 
churches  were  closed ;  no  bell  could  be  rung,  no  marriage  cele- 
brated, no  burial  ceremony  performed.  The  rites  of  baptism  and 
extreme  unction  alone  could  be  administered.  These  spiritual 
punishments  rarely  failed  during  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  centu- 
ries in  bringing  the  most  contumacious  offender  to  a  speedy  and 
abject  confession.     This  will  appear  in  the  following  paragraph. 

Gregory  VII  and  Henry  IV.  of  Germany.  —  The  decree  of 
Gregory  respecting  the  relation  of  the  clergy  to  the  feudal  lords 
created  a  perfect  storm  of  opposition,  not  only  among  the  tem- 
poral princes  and  sovereigns  of  Europe,  but  also  among  the  clergy 
themselves.  The  dispute  thus  begun  distracted  Europe  for  cen- 
turies. 

Gregory  experienced  the  most  formidable  opposition  to  his 
reforms  in  Germany.  The  Emperor  Henry  IV.  refused  to  recog- 
nize his  decree,  and  even  called  a  council  of  the  clergy  of  Ger- 
many and  deposed  him.  Gregory  in  turn  gathered  a  council  at 
Rome,  and  deposed  and  excommunicated  the  emperor.  This 
encouraged  a  revolt  on  the  part  of  some  of  Henry's  discontented 
subjects.  He  was  shunned  as  a  man  accursed  by  heaven.  His 
authority  seemed  to  have  slipped  entirely  out  of  his  hands,  and 
his  kingdom  was  on  the  point  of  going  to  pieces.  In  this  wretched 
state  of  his  affairs  there  was  but  one  thing  for  him  to  do,  —  to  go 
to  Gregory,  and  humbly  sue  for  pardon  and  re-instatemeht  in  the 
favor  of  the  Church. 

Henry  sought  the  Pontiff  at  Canossa  among  the  Apennines. 
But  Gregory  refused  to  admit  the  penitent  to  his  presence.  It 
was  winter,  and  for  three   successive  days  the   king,  clothed  in 


HENRY  IV.    OF  GERMANY.  455 

sackcloth,  stood  with  bare  feet  in  the  snow  of  the  court-yard  of  the 
palace,  waiting  for  permission  to  kneel  at  the  feet  of  the  Pontiff 
and  to  receive  forgiveness.  On  the  fourth  day  the  penitent  king 
was  admitted  to  the  presence  of  Gregory,  who  re-instated  him  in 
favor  —  to  the  extent  of  removing  the  sentence  of  excommunica- 
tion (1077). 

Henry  afterwards  avenged  his  humiliation.  He  raised  an  army, 
invaded  Italy,  and  drove  Gregory  into  exile  at  Salerno,  where  he 
died.  His  last  words  were,  "  I  have  loved  justice  and  hated  in- 
iquity, and  therefore  I  die  in  exile  "  (1085). 

But  the  quarrel  did  not  end  here.  It  was  taken  up  by  the  suc- 
cessors of  Gregory,  and  Henry  was  again  excommunicated.  After 
maintaining  a  long  struggle  with  the  power  of  the  Church,  and 
with  his  own  sons,  who  were  incited  to  rebel  against  him,  he  at 
last  died  of  a  broken  heart  (1106). 

The  Popes  and  the  Hohenstaufen  Emperors.  —  In  the  twelfth 
century  began  the  long  and  fierce  contention — lasting  more  than 
a  hundred  years  —  between  the  Papal  See  and  the  emperors  of 
the  proud  House  of  Hohenstaufen  (see  p.  504).  It  was  simply 
the  continuation  and  culmination  of  the  struggle  begun  long  before 
to  decide  which  should  be  supreme,  the  "world-priest"  or  the 
"  world-king."  The  outcome  was  the  final  triumph  of  the  Roman 
bishops  and  the  utter  ruin  of  the  Hohenstaufen. 

The  Papacy  at  its  Height. —The  authority  of  the  Popes  was 
at  its  height  during  the  thirteenth  century.  The  beginning  of  this 
period  of  papal  splendor  is  marked  by  the  accession  to  the  pon- 
tifical throne  of  Innocent  III.  (1 198-12 16),  the  greatest  of  the 
Popes  after  Gregory  VII.  Under  him  was  very  nearly  made  good 
the  papal  claim  that  all  earthly  sovereigns  were  merely  vassals  of 
the  Roman  Pontiff.  Almost  all  the  kings  and  princes  of  Europe 
swore  fealty  to  him  as  their  overlord.  "  Rome  was  once  more  the 
mistress  of  the  world." 

Pope  Innocent  m  and  Philip  Augustus  of  France.  —  One  of 
Innocent's  most  signal  triumphs  in  his  contest  with  the  kings  of 
Europe  was  gained  over  Philip  Augustus  (1 180-1223)  of  France. 


456  SUPREMACY  OF   THE  PAPACY. 

That  king  having  put  away  his  wife,  Innocent  commanded  him  to 
take  her  back,  and  forced  him  to  submission  by  means  of  an 
interdict.  "This  submission  of  such  a  prince,"  says  Hallam,  "not 
feebly  superstitious  like  his  predecessor  Robert,  nor  vexed  with 
seditions,  like  the  Emperor  Henry  IV.,  but  brave,  firm,  and 
victorious,  is  perhaps  the  proudest  trophy  in  the  scutcheon  of 
Rome." 

Pope  Innocent  III.  and  King  John  of  England.  —  Innocent's 
quarrel  with  King  John  (1199-1216)  of  England  will  afford 
another  illustration  of  the  power  of  the  Popes.  The  See  of  Can- 
terbury falling  vacant,  John  ordered  the  monks  who  had  the  right 
of  election  to  give  the  place  to  a  favorite  of  his.  They  obeyed ; 
but  the  Pope  immediately  declared  the  election  void,  and  caused 
the  vacancy  to  be  filled  with  one  of  his  own  friends,  Stephen 
Langton.  John  declared  that  the  Pope's  archbishop  should  never 
enter  England  as  primate,  and  proceeded  to  confiscate  the  estates 
of  the  See.  Innocent  III.  now  laid  all  England  under  an  interdict, 
excommunicated  John,  and  incited  the  French  king,  Philip  Augus- 
tus, to  undertake  a  crusade  against  the  contumacious  rebel. 

The  outcome  of  the  matter  was  that  John,  like  the  German 
Emperor  before  him,  was  compelled  to  yield  to  the  power  of  the 
Church.  He  gave  back  the  lands  he  had  confiscated,  acknowl- 
edged Langton  to  be  the  rightful  primate  of  England,  and  even 
went  so  far  as  to  give  England  to  the  Pope  as  a  perpetual  fief. 
In  token  of  his  vassalage  he  agreed  to  pay  to  the  Papal  See  the 
annual  sum  of  1000  marks.  This  tribute  money  was  actually 
paid,  though  with  very  great  irregularity,  until  the  seventeenth 
year  of  the  reign  of  Edward  I.  (1289). 

The  Mendicants,  or  Begging  Friars.  —  The  authority  of  the 
immediate  successors  of  Innocent  III.  was  powerfully  supported 
by  the  monastic  orders  of  the  Dominicans  and  Franciscans, 
established  early  in  the  thirteenth  century.  They  were  named 
after  their  respective  founders,  St.  Dominic  (11 70-1221)  and  St. 
Francis  (1 182-1226).  The  principles  on  which  these  fraternities 
were  established  were  very  different  from  those  which  had  shaped 


REMOVAL   OF  THE  PAPAL   SEAT.  457 

all  previous  monastic  institutions.  Until  now  the  monk  had  sought 
cloistral  solitude  in  order  to  escape  from  the  world,  and  through 
penance  and  prayer  and  contemplation  to  work  out  his  own  salva- 
tion. In  the  new  orders,  the  monk  was  to  give  himself  wholly  to 
the  work  of  securing  the  salvation  of  others. 

Again,  the  orders  were  also  as  orders  to  renounce  all  earthly 
possessions,  and,  "  espousing  Poverty  as  a  bride,"  to  rely  entirely 
for  support  upon  the  alms  of  the  pious.  Hitherto,  while  the  indi- 
vidual members  of  a  monastic  order  must  affect  extreme  poverty, 
the  house  or  fraternity  might  possess  any  amount  of  communal 
wealth. 

The  new  fraternities  grew  and  spread  with  marvellous  rapidity, 
and  in  less  than  a  generation  they  quite  overshadowed  all  of  the 
old  monastic  orders  of  the  Church.  The  Popes  conferred  many 
and  special  privileges  upon  them,  and  they  in  turn  became  the 
staunchest  friends  and  supporters  of  the  Roman  See.  They  were 
to  the  Papacy  of  the  thirteenth  century  what  the  later  order  of 
the  Jesuits  was  to  the  Roman  Church  of  the  seventeenth  (see 
p.  528). 

Removal  of  the  Papal  Seat  to  Avignon  (1309).  —  Having 
now  noticed  some  of  the  most  prominent  circumstances  and  inci- 
dents that  marked  the  gradual  advance  of  the  bishops  of  Rome 
to  almost  universal  political  and  ecclesiastical  sovereignty,  we 
shall  next  direct  attention  to  some  of  the  chief  events  that  marked 
the  decline  of  their  temporal  power,  and  prepared  the  way  for  the 
rejection,  at  a  later  date,  by  a  large  part  of  Christendom,  of  their 
spiritual  authority. 

One  of  the  severest  blows  given  both  the  temporal  and  the  spir- 
itual authority  of  the  Popes  was  the  removal,  in  1309,  through  the 
influence  of  the  French  king,  Philip  the  Fair,  of  the  papal  chair 
from  Rome  to  Avignon,  in  Provence,  near  the  frontier  of  France. 
Here  it  remained  for  a  space  of  about  seventy  years,  an  era  known 
in  Church  history  as  the  Babylonian  Captivity.  While  it  was  es- 
tablished here,  all  the  Popes  were  French,  and  of  course  all  their 
policies  were  shaped  and  controlled  by  the  French  kings.     "  In 


458  SUPREMACY  OF  THE  PAPACY. 

that  city,"  says  Stille,  "  the  Papacy  ceased,  in  the  eyes  of  a  very 
large  part  of  Christendom,  to  possess  that  sacred  cosmopolitan 
character  which  no  doubt  had  had  much  to  do  with  the  veneration 
and  respect  with  which  the  Catholic  authority  had  been  regarded." 

The  Great  Schism  (1378).  —  The  discontent  awakened  among 
the  Italians  by  the  situation  of  the  papal  court  at  length  led  to  an 
open  rupture  between  them  and  the  French  party.  In  1378  the 
opposing  factions  each  elected  a  Pope,  and  thus  there  were  two 
heads  of  the  Church,  one  at  Avignon  and  the  other  at  Rome. 

The  spectacle  of  two  rival  Popes,  each  claiming  to  be  the  right- 
ful successor  of  St.  Peter  and  the  sole  infallible  head  of  the 
Church,  very  naturally  led  men  to  question  the  claims  and  infalli- 
bility of  both.  It  gave  the  reverence  which  the  world  had  so  gen- 
erally held  for  the  Roman  See  a  rude  shock,  and  one  from  which 
it  never  recovered. 

The  Church  Councils  of  Pisa  and  Constance.  —  Finally,  in  1409, 
a  general  council  of  the  Church  assembled  at  Pisa,  for  the  purpose 
of  composing  the  shameful  quarrel.  This  council  deposed  both 
Popes,  and  elected  Alexander  V.  as  the  supreme  head  of  the 
Church.  But  matters  instead  of  being  mended  hereby  were  only 
made  worse ;  for  neither  of  the  deposed  pontiffs  would  lay  down 
his  authority  in  obedience  to  the  demands  of-  the  council,  and 
consequently  there  were  now  three  Popes  instead  of  two. 

In  1414  another  council  was  called,  at  Constance,  for  the  settle- 
ment of  the  growing  dispute.  Two  of  the  claimants  were  deposed, 
and  one  resigned.  A  new  Pope  was  then  elected,  —  Pope  Martin 
V.  In  his  person  the  Catholic  world  was  again  united  under  a 
single  spiritual  head.  The  schism  was  outwardly  healed,  but  the 
wound  had  been  too  deep  not  to  leave  permanent  marks  upon  the 
Church. 

The  Eevolt  of  the  Temporal  Princes.  —  Taking  advantage  of 
the  declining  authority  of  the  Papal  See,  the  temporal  rulers  in 
France,  Germany,  and  England  successively  revolted,  and  freed 
themselves  from  the  authority  of  the  Papacy  as  touching  political 
or  governmental  affairs.     But  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the 


REVOLT   OF  THE    TEMPORAL  PRLNCES.  459 

princes  or  governments  that  at  this  time  repudiated  the  temporal 
authority  of  the  Papal  See,  did  not  think  of  challenging  the  claims 
of  the  Popes  to  recognition  as  the  supreme  head  of  the  Church, 
and  the  rightful  arbiters  in  all  spiritual  matters.  At  the  very  time 
that  they  were  striving  to  emancipate  themselves  from  papal  con- 
trol in  temporal  matters,  they  were  lending  the  Church  all  their 
strength  to  punish  heresy  and  schism.  Thus  the  Albigenses  ■  in 
Southern  France,  the  Lollards 2  in  England,  and  the  Hussites 3  in 
Bohemia,  were  extirpated  or  punished  by  the  civil  authorities,  act- 
ing either  in  accordance  with  the  then  universal  idea  of  how  heresy 
should  be  dealt  with,  or  in  obedience  to  the  commands  of  the 
Roman  See. 

1  See  p.  493.  2  See  p.  491.  3  See  p.  506. 


460  CONQUESTS   OF  THE    TURANIAN  TRIBES. 


CHAPTER    XLIV. 

CONQUESTS   OF  THE  TURANIAN  TRIBES. 

The  Huns  and  the  Hungarians. — The  Huns,  of  whom  we  have 
already  told,  were  the  first  Turanians  that  during  historic  times 
pushed  their  way  in  among  the  peoples  of  Europe  (see  p.  345 ) . 

The  next  Turanian  invaders  of  Europe  that  we  need  here  notice 
were  the  Magyars,  or  Hungarians,  another  branch  of  the  Hunnic 
race,  who  in  the  ninth  century  of  our  era  succeeded  in  thrusting 
themselves  far  into  the  continent,  and  establishing  there  the  impor- 
tant Kingdom  of  Hungary.  These  people,  in  marked  contrast  to 
almost  every  other  tribe  of  Turanian  origin,  adopted  the  manners, 
customs,  and  religion  of  the  peoples  about  them  —  became,  in  a 
word,  thoroughly  Europeanized,  and  for  a  long  time  were  the  main 
defence  of  Christian  Europe  against  the  Turkish  tribes  of  the  same 
race  that  followed  closely  in  their  footsteps. 

The  Seljukian  Turks.  —  The  Seljukian  Turks,  so  called  from 
the  name  of  one  of  their  chiefs,  are  the  next  Tartar  people  that 
thrust  themselves  prominently  upon  our  notice.  It  was  the  cap- 
ture of  the  holy  places  in  Palestine  by  this  intolerant  race,  and 
their  threatening  advance  towards  the  Bosporus,  that  alarmed  the 
Christian  nations  of  Europe,  and  led  to  the  First  Crusade. 

The  blows  dealt  the  empire  of  the  Seljuks  by  the  crusaders,  and 
disputes  respecting  the  succession,  caused  the  once  formidable 
sovereignty  to  crumble  to  pieces,  only,  however,  to  be  replaced  by 
others  of  equally  rapid  growth,  destined  to  as  quick  a  decay. 

The  Mongols,  or  Moguls.  —  While  the  power  of  the  Seljukian 
Turks  was  declining  in  Western  Asia,  the  Mongols,  or  Moguls,  a 
fierce  and  utterly  untamed  Tartar  tribe  that  first  issued  from  the 
easternmost  part  of  Chinese  Tartary,  were  building  up  a  new 
dynasty  among  the  various  tribes  of  the  central  portion  of  the  con- 


THE  MONGOLS.  461 

tinent.  In  the  year  1 156  was  born  their  greatest  chieftain,  Temujin, 
afterwards  named  Genghis  Khan,  or  "Universal  Sovereign,"  the 
most  terrible  scourge  that  ever  afflicted  the  human  race.  At  the 
head  of  vast  armies,  made  up  of  numerous  Turanian  hordes,  he 
traversed  with  sword  and  torch  a  great  part  of  Asia.  It  is  estimated 
that  his  enormous  empire  was  built  up  at  the  cost  of  fifty  thousand 
cities  and  towns  and  five  millions  of  lives, — a  greater  waste,  proba- 
bly, than  resulted  from  all  the  Crusades. 

The  successors  of  Genghis  Khan  still  farther  enlarged  and 
strengthened  the  monarchy,  so  that  it  came  to  embrace,  besides 
the  best  part  of  Asia,  a  considerable  portion  of  Europe  as  well. 
At  length  the  immoderately  extended  empire  fell  into  disorder, 
and  became  broken  into  many  petty  states.  It  was  restored  by 
Tamerlane,  or  Timour  the  Lame  (born  about  1336),  a  descendant 
of  Genghis  Khan.  With  his  wild  Mongolian  hordes  he  traversed 
anew  almost  all  the  countries  that  had  been  desolated  by  the  san- 
guinary marches  of  his  predecessors.  The  route  of  the  barbarians 
was  everywhere  marked  by  ruined  fields  and  burned  villages. 

Asia  has  never  recovered  from  the  terrible  devastation  of  the 
Mongol  conquerors.  Many  districts,  swarming  with  life,  were  en- 
tirely swept  of  their  population  by  these  destroyers  of  the  race, 
and  have  remained  to  this  day  desolate  as  the  tomb. 

The  immense  empire  of  Tamerlane  crumbled  to  pieces  after  his 
death.  One  of  its  fragments  had  a  remarkable  history.  This  was 
the  dynasty  established  in  India,  which  became  known  as  the 
Kingdom  of  the  Great  Moguls.  This  Mongol  state  lasted  upwards 
of  300  years,  —  until  destroyed  by  the  English  in  the  present 
century.  The  magnificence  of  the  court  of  the  Great  Moguls  at 
Delhi  and  Agra  is  one  of  the  most  splendid  traditions  of  the  East. 

Tin.  Ottoman  Empire. 

Founding  of  the  Empire. —The  latest,  most  permanent,  and 
most  important  of  the  Tartar  sovereignties  was  established  by  the 
Ottoman  Turks,  who  were  an  offshoot  of  the  Seljukians.     Gradually 


462  CONQUESTS   OF  THE    TURANIAN  TRIBES. 

this  martial  race  seized  province  after  province  of  the  Asiatic  pos- 
sessions of  the  Byzantine  emperors.  Through  the  quarrels  that 
were  constantly  distracting  Constantinople,  they  at  last  gained 
a  foothold  in  Europe  (1353).  During  the  reign  of  Amurath  I. 
(136 0-1389),  a  large  part  of  the  country  known  as  Turkey  in 
Europe  fell  into  their  hands. 

Conquests  of  Bajazet  (1389-1403).  —  Amurath  was  followed  by 
his  son  Bajazet  who,  by  the  rapid  advance  of  his  arms,  spread  the 
greatest  alarm  throughout  Western  Europe.  The  warriors  of  Hun- 
gary, Germany,  and  France  united  their  armies  to  arrest  his  prog- 
ress;  but  their  combined  forces,  numbering  100,000  men,  were 
cut  to  pieces  by  the  sabres  of  the  Turks  on  the  fatal  field  of  Nicop- 
olis,  in  Bulgaria  (1396).  Bajazet  now  vowed  that  he  would 
stable  his  horse  in  the  Cathedral  of  St.  Peter  at  Rome,  and  there 
seemed  no  power  in  Christendom  to  prevent  the  sacrilege. 

Before  proceeding  to  fulfil  his  threat,  however,  Bajazet  turned 
back  to  capture  Constantinople,  which  he  believed  in  the  present 
despondent  state  of  its  inhabitants  would  make  little  or  no  resist- 
ance. Now  it  happened  that  just  at  this  time  Tamerlane  was  lead- 
ing the  Mongols  on  their  career  of  conquest.  He  directed  them 
against  the  Turks  in  Asia  Minor,  and  Bajazet  was  forced  to  raise 
the  siege  of  Constantinople,  and  hasten  across  the  Bosporus,  to 
check  the  advance  in  his  dominions  of  these  new  enemies.  The 
Turks  and  Mongols  met  upon  the  plains  of  Angora,  where  the 
former  suffered  a  disastrous  defeat  (1402).  The  battle  of  Angora 
checked  for  a  time  the  conquests  of  the  Ottomans,  and  saved 
Constantinople  to  the  Christian  world  for  another  period  of  fifty 
years. 

The  Capture  of  Constantinople  (1453).  —  The  Ottomans  grad- 
ually recovered  from  the  blow  they  had  received  at  Angora.  In 
the  year  142 1  they  made  another  attempt  upon  Constantinople, 
but  were  unsuccessful.  Finally,  in  the  year  1453,  Mohammed  II., 
the  Great,  sultan  of  the  Ottomans,  laid  siege  to  the  capital,  with 
an  army  of  over  200,000  men.  After  a  short  investment,  the 
place  was  taken  by  storm.     The  Cross,  which  since  the  time  of 


CHECK   TO    THE   OTTOMAN  ARMS.  463 

Constantine  the  Great  had  surmounted  the  dome  of  St.  Sophia, 
was  replaced  by  the  Crescent,  which  remains  to  this  day. 

Check  to  the  Ottoman  Arms.  —  The  consternation  which  the 
fall  of  Byzantium  created  throughout  Christendom  was  like  the 
dismay  which  filled  the  world  upon  the  downfall  of  Rome  in 
the  fifth  century.  All  Europe  now  lay  open  to  the  Moslem  bar- 
barians, and  there  seemed  nothing  to  prevent  their  marching  to 
the  Atlantic.  But  the  warriors  of  Hungary  made  a  valiant  stand 
against  the  invaders,  and  succeeded  in  checking  their  advance 
upon  the  continent,  while  the  Knights  of  St.  John  (see  p.  443), 
now  established  in  the  island  of  Rhodes,  held  them  in  restraint  in 
the  Mediterranean.  Mohammed  II.  did  succeed  in  planting  the 
Crescent  upon  the  shores  of  Italy  —  capturing  and  holding  for  a 
year  the  city  of  Otranto,  in  Calabria ;  but  by  the  time  of  the  death 
of  that  energetic  prince,  the  conquering  energy  of  the  Ottomans 
seems  to  have  nearly  spent  itself,  and  the  limits  of  their  empire 
were  not  afterwards  materially  enlarged. 

The  Turks  have  ever  remained  quite  insensible  to  the  influences 
of  European  civilization,  and  their  government  has  been  a  perfect 
blight  and  curse  to  the  countries  subjected  to  their  rule.  They 
have  always  been  looked  upon  as  intruders  in  Europe,  and  their 
presence  there  has  led  to  several  of  the  most  sanguinary  wars  of 
modern  times.  Gradually  they  are  being  pushed  out  from  their 
European  possessions,  and  the  time  is  probably  not  very  far  distant 
when  they  will  be  driven  back  across  the  Bosporus,  as  their 
Moorish  brethren  were  expelled  long  ago  from  the  opposite  corner 
of  the  continent  by  the  Christian  chivalry  of  Spain. 


464  GROWTH  OF  THE    TOWNS. 


CHAPTER    XLV. 

GROWTH    OF    THE    TOWNS:    THE    ITALIAN    CITY-REPUBLICS. 

Relation  of  the  Cities  to  the  Feudal  Lords. — When  Feudalism 
took  possession  of  Europe,  the  cities  became  a  part  of  the  system. 
Each  town  formed  a  part  of  the  fief  in  which  it  happened  to  be 
situated,  and  was  subject  to  all  the  incidents  of  feudal  ownership. 
It  owed  allegiance  to  its  lord,  must  pay  to  him  feudal  tribute,  and 
aid  him  in  his  war  enterprises.  As  the  cities,  through  their  manu- 
factures and  trade,  were  the  most  wealthy  members  of  the  Feudal 
System,  the  lords  naturally  looked  to  them  for  money  when  in 
need.  Their  exactions  at  last  became  unendurable,  and  a  long 
struggle  broke  out  between  them  and  the  burghers,  which  resulted 
in  what  is  known  as  the  enfranchisement  of  the  towns. 

It  was  in  the  eleventh  century  that  this  revolt  of  the  cities  against 
the  feudal  lords  become  general.  During  the  course  of  this  and 
the  succeeding  century,  the  greater  number  of  the  towns  of  the 
countries  of  Western  Europe  either  bought,  or  wrested  by  force  of 
arms,  charters  from  their  lords  or  suzerains.  The  cities  thus  char- 
tered did  not  become  independent  of  the  feudal  lords,  but  they 
acquired  the  right  of  managing,  with  more  or  less  supervision, 
their  own  affairs,  and  were  secured  against  arbitrary  and  oppres- 
sive taxation.  This  was  a  great  gain  ;  and  as,  under  the  protection 
of  their  charters,  they  increased  in  wealth  and  population,  very 
many  of  them  grew  at  last  strong  enough  to  cast  off  all  actual  de- 
pendence upon  lord  or  suzerain,  and  became  in  effect  independent 
states  —  little  commonwealths.  Especially  was  this  true  in  the 
case  of  the  Italian  cities,  and  in  a  less  marked  degree  in  that  of 
the  German  towns. 

Rise  of  the  Italian  City-Republics.  —  The  Italian  cities  were 
the  first  to  rise  to  power  and  importance.     Several  things  conspired 


RISE   OF  THE  ITALIAN  CITY-REPUBLICS. 


465 


to  secure  their  early  and  rapid  development,  but  the  main  cause 
of  their  prosperity  was  their  trade  with  the  East,  and  the  enormous 
impulse  given  to  this  commerce  by  the  Crusades. 

With  wealth  came  power,  and  all  the  chief  Italian  cities  became 


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A   MEDI/CVAL  SIEGE,   SHOWING    BALLISTAE,    ETC.     (By  Alphonse  de  Neuvill..) 

distinct,  self-governing  states,  with  just  a  nominal  dependence  upon 
the  pope  or  the  emperor.  Towards  the  close  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  Northern  and  Central  Italy  was  divided  among  about  two 
hundred  contentious  little  city-republics.  Italy  had  become  another 
Greece. 


466 


ITALIAN  CITY-REPUBLICS. 


The  Establishment  of  Tyrannies.  —  Just  what  happened  among 
the  contending  republics  of  Greece  took  place  in  the  case  of  the 
quarrelling  city-commonwealths  of  Italy.  Their  republican  con- 
stitutions were  overthrown,  and  the  supreme  power  fell  into  the 
hands  of  an  ambitious  aristocracy,  or  was  seized  by  some  bold 
usurper,  who  often  succeeded  in  making  the  government  heredi- 
tary in  his  family.  Before  the  close  of  the  fourteenth  century 
almost  all  the  republics  of  the  peninsula  had  become  converted 
into  exclusive  oligarchies  or  hereditary  principalities. 

We  shall  now  relate  some  circumstances,  for  the  most  part  of  a 
commercial  character,  which  concern  some  of  the  most  renowned 
of  the  Italian  city-states. 

Venice.  —  Venice,  the  most  celebrated  of  the  Italian  republics, 
had  its  beginnings  in  the  fifth  century,  in  the  rude  huts  of  some 

refugees  who  fled 
out  in  to  the  marsh- 
es of  the  Adriatic 
to  escape  the  fury 
of  the  Huns  of 
Attila(seep.346). 
Conquests  and 
negotiations  grad- 
ually extended  the 
possessions  of  the 
island-city  until 
she  came  to  con- 
trol the  coasts  and 
waters  of  the  East- 
ern Mediterranean  in  much  the  same  way  that  Carthage  had  mas- 
tery of  the  Western  Mediterranean  at  the  time  of  the  First  Punic 
War.  Even  before  the  Crusades  her  trade  with  the  East  was 
very  extensive,  and  by  those  expeditions  was  expanded  into  enor- 
mous proportions. 

Venice  was  at  the  height  of  her  power  during  the  thirteenth, 
fourteenth,  and  fifteenth  centuries.     Her  supremacy  on  the  sea 


PALACE   OF   THE    DOGES.     (From  a  photograph.) 


GENOA.  —  FL  ORENCE.  467 

was  celebrated  each  year  by  the  brilliant  ceremony  of  "  Wedding 
the  Adriatic,"  by  the  dropping  of  a  ring  into  the  sea. 

The  decline  of  Venice  dates  from  the  fifteenth  century.  The 
conquests  of  the  Turks  during  that  century  deprived  her  of  much 
of  the  territory  she  held  east  of  the  Adriatic,  and  finally  the  voyage 
of  Vasco  da  Gama  round  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  (1497-8), 
showing  a  new  path  to  India,  gave  a  death-blow  to  her  com- 
merce. From  this  time  forward,  the  trade  of  Europe  with  the 
East  was  to  be  conducted  from  the  Atlantic  ports  of  the  continent 
instead  of  from  those  in  the  Mediterranean. 

Genoa.  —  Genoa,  on  the  western  coast  of  Italy,  was  the  most 
formidable  commercial  rival  of  Venice.  The  period  of  her  great- 
est prosperity  dates  from  the  recapture  of  Constantinople  from  the 
Latins  by  the  Greeks  in  1261  ;  for  the  Genoese  had  assisted  the 
Greek  princes  in  the  recovery  of  their  throne,  and  as  a  reward 
were  shown  commercial  favors  by  the  Greek  emperors. 

The  jealousy  with  which  the  Venetians  regarded  the  prosperity 
of  the  Genoese  led  to  oft-renewed  war  between  the  two  rival  repub- 
lics. For  nearly  two  centuries  their  hostile  fleets  contended,  as 
did  the  navies  of  Rome  and  Carthage  during  the  First  Punic  War, 
for  the  supremacy  of  the  sea. 

The  merchants  of  Genoa,  like  those  of  Venice,  reaped  a  rich 
harvest  during  the  Crusades.  Their  prosperity  was  brought  to  an 
end  by  the  irruption  of  the  Mongols  and  Turks,  and  the  capture  of 
Constantinople  by  the  latter  in  1453.  The  Genoese  traders  were 
now  driven  from  the  Black  Sea,  and  their  traffic  with  Eastern  Asia 
was  completely  broken  up ;  for  the  Venetians  had  control  of  the 
ports  of  Egypt  and  Syria  and  the  southern  routes  to  India  and  the 
countries  beyond  —  that  is,  the  routes  by  way  of  the  Euphrates 
and  the  Red  Sea. 

Florence.  —  Florence,  although  shut  out,  by  her  inland  location 
upon  the  Arno,  from  engaging  in  those  naval  enterprises  that  con- 
ferred wealth  and  importance  upon  the  coast  cities  of  Venice  and 
Genoa,  became,  notwithstanding,  through  the  skill,  industry,  enter- 
prise, and  genius  of  her  citizens,  the  great  manufacturing,  financial, 


468 


ITALIAN  CITY-REPUBLICS. 


literary,  and  art  centre  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  list  of  her  illus- 
trious citizens,  of  her  poets,  statesmen,  historians,  architects,  sculp- 
tors, and  painters,  is  more  extended  than  that  of  any  other  city 
of  mediaeval  times ;  and  indeed,  as  respects  the  number  of  her 
great  men,  Florence  is  perhaps  unrivalled  by  any  city,  excepting 
Athens,  of  the  ancient  or  the  modern  world.1       * 

The  Hanseatic  League.  —  From  speaking  of  the  Italian  city- 
republics,  we  must  now  turn  to  say  a  word  respecting  the  free  cities 
of  Germany,  in  which  country,  next  after  Italy,  the  mediaeval  munic- 
ipalities had  their  most  perfect  development,  and  acquired  their 
greatest  power  and  influence. 


ROBBER   KNIGHTS. 

When,  in  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries,  the  towns  of  North- 
ern Europe  began  to  extend  their  commercial  connections,  the 
greatest  drawback  to  their  trade  was  the  general  insecurity  and 
disorder  that  everywhere  prevailed.  The  trader,  who  entrusted  his 
goods  designed  for  the  Italian  market  to  the  overland  routes  was 
in  danger  of  losing  them  at  the  hands  of  the  robber  nobles,  who 

1  In  her  long  roll  of  fame  we  find  the  names  of  Dante,  Petrarch,  Boccaccio, 
Macchiavelli,  Michael  Angelo,  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Galileo,  Amerigo  Vespucci, 
and  the  Medici. 


THE  MEDIAEVAL    CITIES.  469 

watched  all  the  lines  of  travel,  and  either  robbed  the  merchant 
outright,  or  levied  an  iniquitous  toll  upon  his  goods.  The  plebeian 
tradesmen,  in  the  eyes  of  these  patrician  barons,  had  no  rights 
which  they  felt  bound  to  respect.  Nor  was  the  way  to  Italy  by 
the  Baltic  and  the  North  Sea  beset  with  less  peril.  Piratical  crafts 
scoured  those  waters,  and  made  booty  of  any  luckless  merchant- 
man they  might  overpower,  or  lure  to  wreck  upon  the  dangerous 
shores. 

This  state  of  things  led  some  of  the  German  cities,  about  the 
middle  of  the  fourteenth  century,  to  form,  for  the  protection  of 
their  merchants,  an  alliance  called  the  Hanseatic  League.  The 
confederation  eventually  embraced  eighty-five  of  the  principal 
towns  of  North  Germany.  In  order  to  facilitate  the  trading  opera- 
tions of  its  members,  the  League  established  in  different  parts  of  the 
world  trading-posts  and  warehouses.  The  four  most  noted  centres 
of  the  trade  of  the  confederation  were  the  cities  of  Bruges,  Lon- 
don, Bergen,  and  Novgorod.  The  League  thus  became  a  vast 
monopoly,  which  endeavored  to  control,  in  the  interests  of  its  own 
members,  the  entire  commerce  of  Northern  Europe. 

Among  other  causes  of  the  dismemberment  of  the  association 
may  be  mentioned  the  maritime  discoveries  of  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury, which  disarranged  all  the  old  routes  of  trade  in  the  north  of 
Europe  as  well  as  in  the  south ;  the  increased  security  which  the 
formation  of  strong  governments  gave  to  the  merchant  class  upon 
sea  and  land ;  and  the  heavy  expense  incident  to  membership  in 
the  association,  resulting  from  its  ambitious  projects.  All  these 
things  combined  resulted  in  the  decline  of  the  power  and  useful- 
ness of  the  League,  and  finally  led  to  its  formal  dissolution  about 
the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Influence  of  the  Mediaeval  Cities. — The  chartered  towns  and 
free  cities  of  the  mediaeval  era  exerted  a  vast  influence  upon  the 
commercial,  social,  artistic,  and  political  development  of  Europe. 

They  were  the  centres  of  the  industrial  and  commercial  life  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  and  laid  the  foundations  of  that  vast  system  of 
international  exchange  and  traffic  which  forms  a  characteristic 
feature  of  modern  European  civilization. 


470  ITALIAN  CITY-REPUBLICS. 

Their  influence  upon  the  social  and  artistic  life  of  Europe  can- 
not be  overestimated.  It  was  within  the  walls  of  the  cities  that 
the  civilization  uprooted  by  the  Teutonic  invaders  first  revived. 
With  their  growing  wealth  came  not  only  power,  but  those  other 
usual  accompaniments  of  wealth,  —  culture  and  refinement.  The 
Italian  cities  were  the  cradle  and  home  of  mediaeval  art,  science, 
and  literature. 

Again,  these  cities  were  the  birthplace  of  political  liberty,  of 
representative  government.  It  was  the  burghers,  the  inhabitants 
of  the  cities,  that  in  England,  in  France,  and  in  Germany  finally 
grew  into  the  Third  Estate,  or  Commons,  the  controlling  political 
class  in  all  these  countries.  In  a  word,  municipal  freedom  was  the 
germ  of  national  liberty. 


SCHOLASTICISM  AND    THE   SCHOOLMEN.  471 


CHAPTER    XLVI. 

THE   REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING. 

By  the  Revival  of  Learning,  in  the  most  general  sense,  is  meant 
the  intellectual  awakening  of  Europe  after  the  languor  and  depres- 
sion of  the  first  mediaeval  centuries.  In  a  narrower  sense,  how- 
ever, the  phrase  is  used  to  designate  that  wonderful  renewal  of 
interest  in  the  old  Greek  and  Latin  authors  which  sprung  up  in 
Italy  about  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century.  We  shall  use 
the  expression  in  its  most  comprehensive  sense,  thus  making  the 
restoration  of  classical  letters  simply  a  part  of  the  great  Revival  of 
Learning. 

Scholasticism  and  the  Schoolmen.  —  One  of  Charlemagne's 
most  fruitful  labors  was  the  establishment  of  schools,  in  connection 
with  the  cathedrals  and  monasteries,  throughout  his  dominions. 
Within  these  schools  there  grew  up  in  the  course  of  time  a  form 
of  philosophy  called,  from  the  place  of  its  origin,  Scholasticism, 
while  its  expounders  were  known  as  Schoolmen.  This  philosophy 
was  a  fusion  of  Christianity  and  Aristotelian  logic.  It  might  be 
defined  as  being,  in  its  later  stages,  an  effort  to  reconcile  revela- 
tion and  reason,  faith  and  philosophy.  Viewed  in  this  light,  it 
was  not  altogether  unlike  that  theological  philosophy  of  the  present 
day  whose  aim  is  to  harmonize  the  Bible  with  the  facts  of  modern 
science. 

The  greatest  of  the  Schoolmen  appeared  in  the  thirteenth  cen- 
tury. Among  them  were  Albertus  Magnus,  Roger  Bacon,  Thomas 
Aquinas,  and  Duns  Scotus.  The  most  eminent  of  these  was 
Thomas  Aquinas  (died  1274),  who  was  called  the  "Angel  of  the 
Schools."  He  was  the  strongest  champion  of  mediaeval  orthodoxy. 
His  remarkable  work,  entitled  the  Summa  Theologica,  outlines  and 
defends  the  whole  scheme  of  Roman  Catholic  theology. 


472  THE  REVIVAL    OF  LEARNING. 

The  Schoolmen  often  busied  themselves  with  the  most  unprofit- 
able questions  in  metaphysics  and  theology,  yet  their  discussions 
were  not  without  good  results.  These  debates  sharpened  the  wits 
of  men,  created  activity  of  thought  and  deftness  in  argument. 
The  schools  of  the  times  became  real  mental  gymnasia,  in  which 
the  young  awakening  mind  of  Europe  received  its  first  training 
and  gained  its  earliest  strength. 

The  Universities.  —  Closely  related  to  the  subject  of  Scholasti- 
cism is  the  history  of  the  universities,  which,  springing  up  in  the 
thirteenth  century,  became  a  powerful  agency  in  the  Revival  of 
Learning.  They  were  for  the  most  part  expansions  of  the  old 
cathedral  and  abbey  schools,  their  transformation  being  effected 
largely  through  the  reputation  of  the  Schoolmen,  who  drew  such 
multitudes  to  their  lectures  that  it  became  necessary  to  reorganize 
the  schools  on  a  broader  basis.  Popes  and  kings  granted  them 
charters  which  conferred  special  privileges  upon  their  faculties 
and  students,  as,  for  instance,  exemption  from  taxation  and  from 
the  jurisdiction  of  the  ordinary  courts.  The  celebrated  University 
of_Paris  was  the  first  founded,  and  that  of  Bologna  was  probably 
next  in  order. 

The  usual  course  of  study  in  the  universities  was  divided  into 
what  was  known  as  the  trivium  and  the  quadrivium.  The  trivium 
embraced  Grammar,  Logic,  and  Rhetoric ;  the  quadrivium,  Arith- 
metic, Geometry,  Astronomy,  and  Music.  These  constituted  the 
seven  liberal  arts.  Greek,  Hebrew,  and  the  physical  sciences  re- 
ceived but  little  attention.  Medicine  had  not  yet  freed  itself  from 
the  influence  of  magic  and  astrology,  and  alchemy  had  not  yet 
given  birth  to  chemistry.  The  Ptolemaic  theory  of  the  universe 
still  held  sway.  However,  in  all  these  matters  the  European  mind 
was  making  progress,  was  blindly  groping  its  way  towards  the  light. 

Influence  of  the  Saracens. — The  progress  of  the  Christian 
scholars  of  Europe  in  the  physical  sciences  was  greatly  accelerated 
by  the  Saracens,  who,  during  the  Dark  Ages,  were  almost  the  sole 
repositories  of  the  scientific  knowledge  of  the  world.  A  part  of 
this  they  gathered  for  themselves,  for  the  Arabian  scholars  were 


EFFECTS   OF  THE    CRUSADES.  473 

original  investigators,  but  a  larger  share  of  it  they  borrowed  from 
the  Greeks.  While  the  Western  nations  were  too  ignorant  to 
know  the  value  of  the  treasures  of  antiquity,  the  Saracens  pre- 
served them  by  translating  into  Arabic  the  scientific  works  of 
Aristotle  and  other  Greek  authors ;  and  then,  when  Europe  was 
prepared  to  appreciate  these  accumulations  of  the  past,  gave  them 
back  to  her.  This  learning  came  into  Europe  in  part  through  the 
channel  of  the  Crusades,  but  more  largely,  and  at  an  earlier  date, 
through  the  Arabian  schools  in  Spain.  Two  of  the  greatest 
scholars  of  the  thirteenth  century,  or  perhaps  of  all  the  mediaeval 
ages,  Roger  Bacon  and  Albertus  Magnus,  owed  very  much  of  their 
scientific  knowledge  to  the  Arabians. 

Effects  of  the  Crusades.  —  Having  in  a  previous  chapter  dwelt 
on  the  effects  of  the  Crusades  upon  the  intellectual  development 
of  the  European  peoples  (see  p.  449)  there  is  no  need  that  we 
here  do  more  than  refer  to  the  matter,  in  order  that  we  may  fix 
in  mind  the  place  of  the  Holy  Wars  among  the  agencies  that  con- 
spired to  bring  about  the  Revival  of  Learning.  The  stimulating, 
quickening,  liberalizing  tendency  of  these  chivalric  enterprises  was 
one  of  the  most  potent  forces  concerned  in  the  mental  movement 
we  are  tracing. 

Rise  of  Modern  Languages  and  Literatures.  —  Between  the 
tenth  and  the  fourteenth  century  the  native  tongues  of  Europe 
began  to  form  literatures  of  their  own.  We  have  already  spoken 
of  the  formation  and  gradual  growth  of  these  languages  (see  p. 
386).  As  soon  as  their  forms  became  somewhat  settled,  then 
literature  was  possible,  and  all  these  speeches  bud  and  blossom 
into  song  and  romance.  This  formation  of  modern  European 
languages  and  birth  of  native  literatures,  was  one  of  the  greatest 
gains  in  the  interest  of  general  intelligence ;  for  the  Schoolmen 
used  the  Latin  language,  and  their  discussions  and  writings  conse- 
quently influenced  only  a  limited  class ;  while  the  native  literatures 
addressed  themselves  to  the  masses,  and  thus  stirred  the  universal 
mind  and  heart  of  Europe. 

The  Revival  of  Classical  Learning.  —  About  the  beginning  of 


474 


THE   REVIVAL    OF  LEARNING. 


the  fourteenth  century  there  sprung  up  in  Italy  a  great  enthusiasm 
for  Greek  and  Latin  literature  and  art.  This  is  what  is  generally 
known  as  the  Italian  Renaissance,  or  the  New  Birth. 

The  Renaissance  divides  itself  as  follows:  i.  The  revival  of 
classical  learning ;  2.  The  revival  of  classical  art.  It  is  with  the  first 
only,  the  intellectual  and  literary  phase  of  the  movement,  that  we 
are  now  concerned.  This  feature  of  the  movement  is  called  Hu- 
manism, and  the  promoters  of  it  are  known  as  Humanists.1     The 

real  originator  of  the  humanistic 
movement  was  Petrarch2  (1304- 
1374).  His  love  for  the  old 
Greek  and  Latin  writers  was  a 
passion  amounting  to  a  worship. 
He  often  wrote  love-letters  to 
his  favorite  authors.  In  one  to 
Homer  he  laments  the  lack  of 
taste  among  his  countrymen,  and 
declares  that  there  are  not  more 
than  ten  persons  in  all  Italy  who 
could  appreciate  the  Iliad.  Next 
to  Petrarch  stands  Boccaccio 
(1313-1375),  as  the  second  of 
the  Humanists. 

Just  as  the  antiquarians  of  to-day  search  the  mounds  of  Assyria 
for  relics  of  the  ancient  civilizations  of  the  East,  so  did  the  Human- 
ists ransack  the  libraries  of  the  monasteries  and  cathedrals,  and  all 
the  out-of-the-way  places  of  Europe,  for  old  manuscripts  of  the 
classic  writers.  The  precious  documents  were  found  covered  with 
mould  in  damp  cellars,  or  loaded  with  dust  in  the  attics  of  monas- 
teries. This  late  search  for  these  remains  of  classical  authors 
saved  to  the  world  hundreds  of  valuable  manuscripts  which,  a  little 

1  That  is,  students  of  the  humanities,  or  polite  literature. 

2  The  great  Florentine  poet,  Dante  (1265-1321),  was  the  forerunner  of 
Humanism,  but  was  not,  properly  speaking,  a  Humanist.  His  Divine  Comedy 
is  the  "  Epic  of  Medievalism." 


DANTE.2 
(From  Raphael's  Disputation.) 


CLASSICAL  LEARNING.  475 

longer  neglected,  would  have  been  forever  lost.  Libraries  were 
founded  in  which  the  new  treasures  might  be  stored,  and  copies  of 
the  manuscripts  were  made  and  distributed  among  all  who  could 
appreciate  them.  It  was  at  this  time  that  the  celebrated  Vatican 
Library  was  established  by  Pope  Nicholas  V.  (144 7- 1455),  one  of 
the  most  generous  promoters  of  the  humanistic  movement. 

This  reviving  interest  in  the  literature  of  ancient  Greece  was 
vastly  augmented  by  the  disasters  just  now  befalling  the  Greek 
empire  (see  p.  462).  From  every  part  of  the  crumbling  state 
scholars  fled  before  the  approach  of  the  barbarians,  and  sought 
shelter  in  the  West,  especially  in  Italy,  bringing  with  them  many 
valuable  manuscripts  of  the  old  Greek  masters,  who  were  almost 
unknown  in  Western  Europe,  and  always  an  enthusiasm  for  Greek 
learning.  There  was  now  a  repetition  of  what  took  place  at  Rome 
upon  the  conquest  of  Greece  in  the  days  of  the  Republic.  Italy 
was  conquered  a  second  time  by  the  genius  of  Greece. 

Before  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the  enthusiasm  for 
classical  authors  had  infected  the  countries  beyond  the  Alps.  The 
New  Learning,  as  it  was  called,  found  a  place  in  the  colleges  and 
universities  of  Germany,  France,  and  England.  Greek  was  added 
to  Latin  as  one  of  the  requirements  in  a  liberal  education,  and  from 
that  day  to  this  has  maintained  a  prominent  place  in  all  our  higher 
institutions  of  learning.  In  Northern  Europe,  however,  the  human- 
istic movement  became  blended  with  other  tendencies.  In  Italy  it 
had  been  an  exclusive  passion,  a  single  devotion  to  classical  litera- 
ture ;  but  here  in  the  North  there  was  added  to  this  enthusiasm  for 
Graeco-Roman  letters  an  equal  and  indeed  supremer  interest  in 
what  we  have  called  the  Hebrew  element  in  civilization  (see  p. 
368).  Petrarch  hung  over  the  pages  of  Homer;  Luther  pores 
over  the  pages  of  the  Bible.  The  Renaissance,  in  a  word,  becomes 
the  Reformation  ;  the  Humanist  becomes  the  Reformer. 

Evil  and  Good  Results  of  the  Classical  Revival.  —  There  were 
some  serious  evils  inherent  in  the  classical  revival.  In  Italy,  espe- 
cially, where  the  humanistic  spirit  took  most  complete  possession 
of  society,  it  was  "disastrous  to  both   faith  and   morals."     The 


476  THE   REVIVAL   OF  LEARNING. 

study  of  the  old  pagan  writers  produced  the  result  predicted  by 
the  monks,  —  caused  a  revival  of  paganism.  To  be  learned  in 
Greek  was  to  excite  suspicion  of  heresy.  With  the  New  Learning 
came  also  those  vices  and  immoralities  that  characterized  the 
decline  of  classical  civilization.  Italy  was  corrupted  by  the  new 
influences  that  flowed  in  upon  her,  just  as  Rome*was  corrupted  by 
Grecian  luxury  and  vice  in  the  days  of  the  failing  republic. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  benefits  of  the  movement  to  European 
civilization  were  varied  and  positive.  The  classical  revival  gave  to 
Europe,  not  only  faultless  literary  models,  but  large  stores  of  valua- 
ble knowledge.  As  Woolsey  says,  "  The  old  civilization  contained 
treasures  of  permanent  value  which  the  world  could  not  spare, 
which  the  world  will  never  be  able  or  willing  to  spare.  These 
were  taken  up  into  the  stream  of  life,  and  proved  true  aids  to  the 
progress  of  a  culture  which  is  gathering  in  one  the  beauty  and 
truth  of  all  the  ages."  And  to  the  same  effect  are  the  words  of 
Symonds,  who  closes  his  appreciative  review  of  the  Italian  Revival 
of  Letters  as  follows  :  "  Such  is  the  Lampadephoria,  or  torch-race, 
of  the  nations.  Greece  stretches  out  her  hand  to  Italy ;  Italy  con- 
signs the  sacred  fire  to  Northern  Europe  ;  the  people  of  the  North 
pass  on  the  flame  to  America,  to  India, 
and  the  Australasian  Isles." 

Printing.  —  One  of  the  most  helpful 
agencies  concerned  in  the  Revival  of 
Learning,  was  the  invention  of  printing 
firom  movable  blocks,  or  type,  —  the 
most  important  discovery,  in  the  esti- 
mation of  Hallam,  recorded  in  the  an- 
nals of  mankind.  For  this  improvement 
john  gutenberg.  tne  wor^  is  probably  indebted  to  John 

Gutenberg  of  Mentz  (1438).1 
The  new  art  would  have  been  much  restricted  in  its  usefulness 
had  it  not  been  for  the  bringing  to  perfection  about  this  time  of 

1  Dutch  writers  maintain  that  the  honor  of  the  invention  belongs  to  Costar 
of  Haarlem. 


PRINTING.  477 

the  art  of  making  paper  from  linen  rags.  This  article  took  the 
place  of  the  costly  parchment,  and  rendered  it  possible  to  place 
books  within  the  reach  of  all  classes. 

The  first  book  printed  from  movable  types  was  a  Latin  copy  of 
the  Bible,  issued  at  Mentz,  in  Germany,  between  the  years  1450 
and  1455.  The  art  spread  rapidly,  and  before  the  close  of  the 
fifteenth  century  presses  were  busy  in  every  country  of  Europe, 
multiplying  books  with  a  rapidity  undreamed  of  by  the  patient 
copyists  of  the  cloister. 

It  is  needless  to  dwell  upon  the  tremendous  impulse  which  the 
new  art  gave,  not  only  to  the  humanistic  movement,  but  to  the 
general  intellectual  progress  of  the  European  nations.  Without  it, 
the  Revival  of  Learning  must  have  languished,  and  the  Reforma- 
tion could  hardly  have  become  a  fact  in  history.  Its  instrument, 
the  press,  is  fitly  chosen  as  the  symbol  of  the  new  era  of  intelligence 
and  freedom  which  it  ushered  in. 


478  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 


CHAPTER   XLVII. 

GROWTH   OF  THE  NATIONS.  — FORMATION    OF  NATIONAL 
GOVERNMENTS   AND   LITERATURES. 

Introductory.  —  The  most  important  movement  that  marked 
the  latter  part  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  the  grouping,  in  several  of 
the  countries  of  Europe,  of  the  petty  feudal  states  and  half- 
independent  cities  and  towns  into  great  nations  with  strong  cen- 
tralized governments.  This  movement  was  accompanied  by,  or 
rather  consisted  in,  the  decline  of  Feudalism  as  a  governmental 
system,  the  loss  by  the  cities  of  their  freedom,  and  the  growth  of 
the  power  of  the  kings. 

Many  things  contributed  to  this  consolidation  of  peoples  and 
governments,  different  circumstances  favoring  the  movement  in 
the  several  countries.  In  some  countries,  however,  events  were 
opposed  to  the  centralizing  tendency,  and  in  these  the  Modern 
Age  was  reached  without  nationality  having  been  found.  But  in 
England,  in  France,  and  in  Spain  circumstances  all  seemed  to  tend 
towards  unity,  and  by  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century  there  were 
established  in  these  countries  strong  despotic  monarchies.  Yet 
even  among  those  peoples  where  national  governments  did  not 
appear,  some  progress  was  made  towards  unity  through  the  forma- 
tion of  national  languages  and  literatures,  and  the  development  of 
common  feelings,  sentiments,  and  aspirations,  so  that  these  peoples 
were  manifestly  only  awaiting  the  opportunities  of  a  happier  period 
for  the  maturing  of  their  national  life. 

This  rise  of  Monarchy  and  decline  of  Feudalism,  this  substitu- 
tion of  strong  centralized  governments  in  place  of  the  feeble, 
irregular,  and  conflicting  authorities  of  the  feudal  nobles,  was  a 
very  great  gain  to  the  cause  of  law  and  good  order.  It  paved  the 
way  for  modern  progress  and  civilization. 


ENGLAND.  479 


i .   England. 


General  Statement.  —  In  preceding  chapters  we  have  told  of 
the  origin  of  the  English  people,  and  traced  their  growth  under 
Saxon,  Danish,  and  Norman  rulers  (see  pp.  375,  411,  433).  We 
shall,  in  the  present  section,  tell  very  briefly  the  story  of  their  prog- 
ress under  the  Plantagenet  kings,  thus  carrying  on  our  narrative 
to  the  accession  of  the  Tudors  in  1485,  from  which  event  dates 
the  beginning  of  the  modern  history  of  England. 

The  era  of  the  Plantagenets,1  which  covers  three  hundred  and 
thirty-one  years,  was  a  most  eventful  one  in  English  history.  The 
chief  political  matters  that  we  shall  notice  were  the  wresting  of 
Magna  Charta  from  King  John,  the  formation  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  the  Conquest  of  Wales,  the  Wars  with  Scotland,  the 
Hundred  Years'  War  with  France,  and  the  Wars  of  the  Roses. 

Magna  Charta  (1215). — Magna  Charta,  the  "Great  Charter," 
held  sacred  as  the  basis  of  English  liberties,  was  an  instrument 
which  the  English  barons  and  clergy  forced  King  John  to  grant,  in 
which  the  ancient  rights  and  privileges  of  the  people  were  clearly 
defined  and  guaranteed. 

King  John  (1199-1216),  the  third  of  the  Plantagenet  line,  was 
as  tyrannical  as  he  was  unscrupulous  and  wicked.  His  course  led 
to  an  open  revolt  of  the  barons,  who  were  resolved  upon  the 
recovery  of  their  ancient  liberties.     The  tyrant  was  forced  to  bow 

1  The  name  Plantagenet  came  from  the  peculiar  badge,  a  sprig  of  broom- 
plant  (plante  de  genet),  adopted  by  one  of  the  early  members  of  the  House. 
Following  is  a  table  of  the  sovereigns  of  the  family :  — 

Henry  II 1154-1189 


Richard  1 1189-1199 

John 1199-1216 

Henry  III 1216-1272 

Edward  1 1 272-1307 

Edward  II 1 307-1327 

Edward  III 1327-1377 

Richard  II 1377-1399 


HOUSE  OF   LANCASTER. 

Henry  IV I399-I4»3 

Henry  V 1413-1422 

Henry  VI 1422-1461 

HOUSE   OF  YORK. 

Edward  IV 1461-1483 

El  ward  V 1483 

Richard  III 1483- 1485 


480  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

to  the  storm  he  had  raised.  He  met  his  barons  at  Runnymede, 
a  meadow  on  the  Thames,  and  there  affixed  his  seal  to  the  instru- 
ment that  had  been  prepared  to  receive  it. 

Among  the  important  articles  of  the  paper  were  the  following  : 
No  freeman  should  be  deprived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  "  save 
by  legal  judgment  of  his  peers."  No  taxes  (save  several  feudal 
aids  specified)  should  be  imposed  "  save  by  the  Common  Council 
of  the  realm." 1 

Besides  these  articles,  which  form  the  foundation  of  the  English 
Constitution,  there  were  others  abolishing  numerous  abuses  and 
confirming  various  time-honored  rights  and  privileges  of  the  towns 
and  of  different  classes  of  freemen. 

The  Great  Charter  was  often  disregarded  and  broken  by 
despotic  sovereigns;  but  the  people  always  clung  to  it  as  the 
warrant  and  basis  of  their  liberties,  and  again  and  again  forced 
tyrannical  kings  to  renew  and  confirm  its  provisions,  and  swear 
solemnly  to  observe  all  its  articles. 

Considering  the  far-reaching  consequences  that  resulted  from 
the  granting  of  Magna  Charta,  —  the  securing  of  constitutional 
liberty  as  an  inheritance  for  the  English-speaking  race  in  all  parts 
of  the  world,  —  it  must  always  be  considered  the  most  important 
concession  that  a  freedom-loving  people  ever  wrung  from  a  tyran- 
nical sovereign. 

Beginning  of  the  House  of  Commons  (1265).  —  The  reign  of 
Henry  III.  (12 16-12 72),  John's  son  and  successor,  witnessed  the 
second  important  step  taken  in  English  constitutional  freedom. 
This  was  the  formation  of  the  House  of  Commons,  Parliament 
having  up  to  this  time  consisted  of  a  single  House,  made  up  of 
nobles  and  bishops.  It  was  again  the  royal  misbehavior  that  led 
to  this  great  change  in  the  form  of  the  English  national  assembly. 

1  This  article  respecting  taxation  was  suffered  to  fall  into  abeyance  in 
the  reign  of  John's  successor,  Henry  III.,  and  it  was  not  until  about  one 
hundred  years  after  the  granting  of  Magna  Charta  that  the  great  principle 
that  the  people  should  be  taxed  only  through  their  representatives  in  Parlia- 
ment, became  fully  established. 


CONQUEST  OF   WALES.  481 

Henry  had  violated  his  oath  to  rule  according  to  the  Great 
Charter,  and  had  become  even  more  tyrannical  than  his  father. 
The  indignant  barons  rose  in  revolt,  and  Henry  and  his  son  being 
worsted  in  a  great  engagement,  known  as  the  battle  of  Lewes 
(1264),  were  made  prisoners. 

Simon  de  Montfort,  a  Frenchman,  whom  Henry  had  given  a 
prominent  position  in  the  government,  now  assumed  control  of 
affairs.  He  issued,  in  the  king's  name,  writs  of  summons  to  the 
nobles  and  bishops  to  meet  in  Parliament ;  and  at  the  same  time 
sent  similar  writs  to  the  sheriffs  of  the  different  shires,  directing 
them  "  to  return  two  knights  for  the  body  of  their  county,  with 
two  citizens  or  burghers  for  every  city  and  borough  contained  in 
it."  This  was  the  first  time  that  plain  untitled  citizens  or  burghers 
had  been  called  to  take  their  place  with  the  knights,  lords,  and 
bishops  in  the  great  council  of  the  nation,  to  join  in  deliberations 
on  the  affairs  of  the  realm.1  The  Commons  were  naturally  at  first 
a  weak  and  timorous  body,  quite  overawed  by  the  great  lords, 
but  were  destined  eventually  to  grow  into  the  controlling  branch 
of  the  British  Parliament. 

Conquest  of  Wales . —  For  more  than  a  thousand  years  the 
Celtic  tribes  of  Wales  maintained  among  their  mountain  fastnesses 
an  ever-renewed  struggle  with  the  successive  invaders  and  con- 
querors of  England  —  with  Roman,  Saxon,  and  Norman.  They 
never  submitted  their  necks  to  the  Roman  yoke,  but  they  were 
forced  to  acknowledge  the  overlordship  of  some  of  the  Saxon  and 
Norman  kings.  They  were  restless  vassals,  however,  and  were 
constantly  withholding  tribute  and  refusing  homage. 

When  Edward  I.  came  to  the  English  throne  in  1272,  Llew- 
ellyn, the  overlord  of  the  Welsh  chiefs,  with  the  title  of  Prince  of 
Wales,  refused  to  render  homage  to  the  new  king.  War  followed. 
Llewellyn  was  slain,  and  the  independence  of  his  race  forever 

1  At  first  the  Commons  could  only  take  part  in  questions  relating  to  taxa- 
tion, but  gradually  they  acquired  the  right  to  share  in  all  matters  that  might 
come  before  Parliament. 


482  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

extinguished  (1282).  The  title  of  the  Welsh  chieftain  has  ever 
since  been  borne  by  the  eldest  son  of  the  English  sovereign. 

Wars  with  Scotland  (1296-1328). —  In  1285  the  ancient 
Celtic  line  of  Scottish  chiefs  became  extinct.  Thirteen  claimants 
for  the  vacant  throne  immediately  arose.  Chief  among  these  were 
Robert  Bruce  and  John  Balliol,  distinguished  noblemen  of  Norman 
descent,  attached  to  the  Scottish  court.  King  Edward  I.  of  Eng- 
land, who  claimed  suzerain  rights  over  the  Scottish  realm,  was 
asked  to  act  as  arbitrator,  and  decide  to  whom  the  crown  should 
be  given.  He  decided  the  question  of  the  succession  in  favor  of 
Balliol,  who  now  took  the  crown  of  Scotland  as  the  acknowledged 
vassal  of  the  English  sovereign. 

Edward's  unjust  demands  on  the  Scottish  king  led  him  to  cast 
off  his  feudal  allegiance.  In  the  war  that  followed,  the  Scots  were 
defeated,  and  Scotland  now  fell  back  as  a  fief  forfeited  by  treason, 
into  the  hands  of  Edward  (1296).  As  a  sign  that  the  Scottish 
kingdom  had  come  to  an  end,  Edward  carried  off  to  London  the 
royal  regalia,  and  with  this  a  large  stone,  known  as  the  Stone  of 
Scone,  upon  which  the  Scottish  kings,  from  time  out  of  memory, 
had  been  accustomed  to  be  crowned.  Legend  declared  that  the 
relic  was  the  very  stone  on  which  Jacob  had  slept  at  Bethel. 
The  block  was  taken  to  Westminster  Abbey,  and  there  made  to 
form  the  seat  of  a  stately  throne-chair,  which  to  this  day  is  used 
in  the  coronation  ceremonies  of  the  English  sovereigns.  It  is 
said  that  the  stone  once  bore  this  legend  :  — 

"  Should  fate  not  fail,  where'er  this  stone  be  found, 
The  Scot  shall  monarch  of  that  realm  be  crowned," 

which  prophecy  was  fulfilled  when  James  VI.  of  Scotland  became 
James  I.  of  England.1 

1  « Whether  the  prophecy  was  actually  inscribed  on  the  stone  may  be 
doubted,  though  this  seems  to  be  implied,  and  on  the  lower  side  is  still  visible 
a  groove  which  may  have  contained  it;  but  the  fact  that  it  was  circulated  and 
believed  as  early  as  the  fourteenth  century,  is  certain."  —  Dean  Stanley's 
Memorials  of  Westminster  Abbey. 


WARS    WITH  SCOTLAND.  483 

The  two  countries  were  not  long  united.  The  Scotch  people 
loved  too  well  their  ancient  liberties  to  submit  quietly  to  this  ex- 
tinguishment of  their  national  independence.  Under  the  inspira- 
tion and  lead  of  the  famous  Sir  William  Wallace,  an  outlaw  knight, 
all  the  Lowlands  were  soon  in  determined  revolt.  It  was  chiefly 
from  the  peasantry  that  the  patriot  hero  drew  his  followers. 
Wallace  gained  some  successes,  but  at  length  was  betrayed  into 
Edward's  hands.  He  was  condemned  to  death  as  a  traitor,  and 
his  head,  garlanded  with  a  crown  of  laurel,  was  exposed  on  Lon- 
don Bridge  (1305).  The  romantic  life  of  Wallace,  his  patriotic 
service,  his  heroic  exploits,  and  his  tragic  death,  at  once  lifted  him 
to  the  place  that  he  has  ever  since  held,  as  the  national  hero  of 
Scotland. 

The  struggle  in  which  Wallace  had  fallen,  was  soon  renewed  by 
the  almost  equally  renowned  hero  Robert  Bruce  (grandson  of  the 
Robert  Bruce  mentioned  on  p.  482),  who  was  the  representative 
of  the  nobles,  as  Wallace  had  been  of  the  common  people.  With 
Edward  II.  Bruce  fought  the  great  Battle  of  Bannockburn,  near 
Stirling.  Edward's  army  was  almost  annihilated  (1314).  It  was 
the  most  appalling  disaster  that  had  befallen  the  arms  of  the  Eng- 
lish people  since  the  memorable  defeat  of  Harold  at  Hastings. 

The  independence  of  Scotland  really  dates  from  the  great  vic- 
tory of  Bannockburn,  but  the  English  were  too  proud  to  acknowl- 
edge it  until  fourteen  years  more  of  war.  Finally,  in  the  year 
1328,  the  young  king  Edward  III.  gave  up  all  claim  to  the  Scot- 
tish crown,  and  Scotland  with  the  hero  Bruce  as  its  king,  took  its 
place  as  an  independent  power  among  the  nations  of  Europe. 

The  independence  gained  by  the  Scotch  at  Bannockburn  was 
maintained  for  nearly  three  centuries,  —  until  1603,  —  when  the 
crowns  of  England  and  Scotland  were  peacefully  united  in  the 
person  of  James  Stuart  VI.  of  Scotland.  During  the  greater  part 
of  these  three  hundred  years  the  two  countries  were  very  quar- 
relsome neighbors. 


484  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

The  Hundred  Years'   War  (1336-145 3). 

Causes  of  the  "War.  — The  long  and  wasteful  war  between  Eng- 
land and  France,  known  in  history  as  the  Hundred  Years'  War, 
was  a  most  eventful  one,  and  its  effects  upon  both  England  and 
France  so  important  and  lasting  as  to  entitle  it  to  a  prominent 
place  in  the  records  of  the  closing  events  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
Freeman  likens  the  contest  to  the  Peloponnesian  War  in  ancient 
Greece. 

The  war  with  Scotland  was  one  of  the  things  that  led  up  to  this 
war.  All  through  that  struggle,  France,  as  the  jealous  rival  of 
England,  was  ever  giving  aid  and  encouragement  to  the  Scotch 
rebels.  Then  the  English  lands  in  France,  for  which  the  English 
king  did  homage  to  the  French  king  as  overlord,  were  a  source  of 
constant  dispute  between  the  two  countries.  Furthermore,  upon 
the  death  of  Charles  IV.,  the  last  of  the  Capetian  line,  Edward  III. 
laid  claim,  through  his  mother,  to  the  French  crown,  in  much  the 
same  way  that  William  of  Normandy  centuries  before  had  laid 
claim  to  the  crown  of  England. 

The  Battle  of  Crecy  (1346).  —  The  first  great  combat  of  the 
long  war  was  the  memorable  battle  of  Crecy.  Edward  had  in- 
vaded France  with  an  army  of  30,000  men,  made  up  largely  of 
English  bowmen,  and  had  penetrated  far  into  the  country,  ravaging 
as  he  went,  when  he  finally  halted,  and  faced  the  pursuing  French 
army  near  the  village  of  Cre cy,  where  he  inflicted  upon  it  a  most 
terrible  defeat;  1200  knights,  the  flower  of  French  chivalry,  and 
30,000  foot-soldiers  lay  dead  upon  the  field. 

The  great  battle  of  Cr£cy  is  memorable  for  several  reasons, 
but  chiefly  because  Feudalism  and  Chivalry  there  received  their 
death-blow.  The  yeomanry  of  England  there  showed  themselves 
superior  to  the  chivalry  of  France.  "The  churl  had  struck  down 
the  noble  j  the  bondsman  proved  more  than  a  match,  in  sheer 
hard  fighting,  for  the  knight.  From  the  day  of  Cr£cy,  Feudalism 
tottered  slowly  but  surely  to  its  grave."  The  battles  of  the  world 
were  hereafter,  with  few  exceptions,  to  be  fought  and  won,  not  by 


THE    CAPTURE   OF  CALAIS. 


485 


mail-clad  knights  with  battle-axe  and  lance,  but  by  common  foot- 
soldiers  with  bow  and  gun. 

The  Capture  of  Calais.  —  From  the  field  of  Crecy  Edward  led 
his  army  to  the  siege  of  Calais.  At  the  end  of  a  year's  investment, 
the  city  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  English.  The  capture  of  this 
sea-port  was  a  very  important  event  for  the  English,  as  it  gave 
them  control  of  the  commerce  of  the  Channel,  and  afforded  them 
a  convenient  landing-place  for  their  expeditions  of  invasion  into 
France. 

The  Battle  of  Poitiers  (1356). — The  terrible  scourge  of  the 
"  Black  Death,"  ■  which  desolated  all  Europe  about  the  middle  of 
the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury, caused  the  con- 
tending nations  for  a 
time  to  forget  their 
quarrel.  But  no 
sooner  had  a  purer 
atmosphere  breathed 
upon  the  continent 
than  the  old  struggle 
was  renewed  with 
fresh  eagerness. 

Edward  III.  plan- 
ned a  double  inva- 
sion of  France.  He 
himself  led  an  army  through  the  already  wasted  provinces  of  the 
North,  while  the  Black  Prince  with  another  army  ravaged  the  fields 
of  the  South.  As  the  Prince's  army,  numbering  about  8000  men, 
loaded  with  booty,  was  making  its  way  back  to  the  coast,  it 
found  its   path,  near  Poitiers,  obstructed   by  a  French  army  of 

1  The  Black  Death  was  so  called  on  account  of  the  black  spots  which  cov- 
ered the  body  of  the  person  attacked.  It  was  a  contagious  fever,  which,  like 
the  pestilence  in  the  reign  of  Justinian,  entered  Europe  from  the  East,  and 
made  terrible  ravages  during  the  years  1347-49.  In  Germany  over  1,000,000 
persons  fell  victims  to  the  plague,  while  in  England,  according  to  some  authori- 


CHARGE  OF    FRENCH    KNIGHTS   AND    FLIGHT   OF 
ENGLISH    ARROWS. 


486  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

50,000.  A  battle  ensued  which  proved  for  the  French  a  second 
Crecy.  The  arrows  of  the  English  bowmen  drove  them  in  fatal 
panic  from  the  field,  which  was  strewn  with  11,000  of  their  dead. 

Battle  of  Agincourt  (1415).  —  For  half  a  century  after  the 
Peace !  that  followed  the  battle  of  Poitiers  there  was  a  lull  in  the 
war.  But  while  Henry  V.  (141 3- 1422)  was  reigning  in  England, 
France  was  unfortunate  in  having  an  insane  king,  Charles  VI. ; 
and  Henry,  taking  advantage  of  the  disorder  into  which  the  French 
kingdom  naturally  fell  under  these  circumstances,  invaded  the 
country  with  a  powerful  army,  defeated  the  French  in  the  great 
battle  of  Agincourt  (141 5),  and  five  years  later  concluded  the 
Treaty  of  Troyes,  in  which,  so  discouraged  had  the  French  be- 
come, a  large  party  agreed  that  the  crown  of  France  should  be 
given  to  him  upon  the  death  of  Charles. 

Joan  of  Arc.  —  But  patriotism  was  not  yet  wholly  extinct  among 
the  French  people.  There  were  many  who  regarded  the  conces- 
sions of  the  Treaty  of  Troyes  as  not  only  weak  and  shameful,  but 
as  unjust  to  the  Dauphin  Charles,  who  was  thereby  disinherited, 
and  they  accordingly  refused  to  be  bound  by  its  provisions.  Con- 
sequently, when  the  poor  insane  king  died,  the  terms  of  the  treaty 
were  not  carried  out,  and  the  war  dragged  on.  The  party  that 
stood  by  their  native  prince,  afterwards  crowned  as  Charles  VII., 
were  at  last  reduced  to  most  desperate  straits.  A  great  part  of 
the  northern  section  of  the  country  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Eng- 
lish, who  were  holding  in  close  siege  the  important  city  of  Orleans. 

But  the  darkness  was  the  deep  gloom  that  precedes  the  dawn. 
A  strange  deliverer  now  appears,  —  the  famous  Joan  of  Arc, 
Maid  of  Orleans.     This  young  peasant  girl,  with  imagination  all 

ties,  one-half  of  the  population  was  swept  away.  The  pestilence  was  also 
especially  severe  in  Florence,  in  Italy.  Under  the  terror  and  excitement  of 
the  dreadful  visitation,  religious  penitents,  thinking  to  turn  away  the  wrath  of 
heaven  by  unusual  penances,  went  about  in  procession,  lacerating  themselves 
with  whips  (hence  they  were  called  flagellants).  This  religious  frenzy  had 
its  most  remarkable  manifestation  in  Germany. 
1  The  Treaty  of  Bretigny  (1360). 


JOAN  OF  ARC.  487 

aflame  from  brooding  over  her  country's  wrongs  and  sufferings, 
seemed  to  see  visions  and  hear  voices,  which  bade  her  undertake 
the  work  of  delivering  France.  She  was  obedient  unto  the  heav- 
enly vision. 

The  warm,  impulsive  French  nation,  ever  quick  in  responding 
to  appeals  to  the  imagination,  was  aroused  exactly  as  it  was  stirred 
by  the  voice  of  the  preachers  of  the  Crusades.  Religious  enthusi- 
asm now  accomplished  what  patriotism  alone  could  not  do. 

Received  by  her  countrymen  as  a  messenger  from  heaven,  the 
maiden  kindled  throughout  the  land  a  flame  of  enthusiasm  that 
nothing  could  resist.  Inspiring  the  dispirited  French  soldiers 
with  new  courage,  she  forced  the  English  to  raise  the  siege  of 
Orleans  (from  which  exploit  she  became  known  as  the  Maid  of 
Orleans),  and  speedily  brought  about  the  coronation  of  Prince 
Charles  at  Reims  (1429).  Shortly  afterward  she  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  English,  and  was  condemned  and  burned  as  a  heretic 
and  witch. 

But  the  spirit  of  the  Maid  had  already  taken  possession  of  the 
French  nation.  From  this  on,  the  war,  though  long  continued, 
went  steadily  against  the  English.  Little  by  little  they  were  pushed 
back  and  off  from  the  soil  they  had  conquered,  until,  by  the  mid- 
dle of  the  fifteenth  century,  they  were  driven  quite  out  of  the 
country,  retaining  no  foothold  in  the  land  save  Calais  (see  p.  553). 

Thus  ended  the  Hundred  Years'  War,  in  1453,  the  very  year 
which  saw  Constantinople  fall  before  the  Turks. 

Effects  upon  England  of  the  War. — The  most  lasting  and 
important  effects  upon  England  of  the  war  were  the  enhancement 
of  the  power  of  the  Lower  House  of  Parliament,  and  the  awaken- 
ing of  a  national  spirit  and  feeling.  The  maintaining  of  the  long 
and  costly  quarrel  called  for  such  heavy  expenditures  of  men  and 
money  that  the  English  kings  were  made  more  dependent  than 
hitherto  upon  the  representatives  of  the  people,  who  were  careful 
to  make  their  grants  of  supplies  conditional  upon  the  correction 
of  abuses  or  the  confirming  of  their  privileges.  Thus  the  war 
served  to  make  the  Commons  a  power  in  the  English  government. 


488  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

Again,  as  the  war  was  participated  in  by  all  classes  alike,  the 
great  victories  of  Crecy,  Poitiers,  and  Agincourt  roused  a  national 
pride,  which  led  to  a  closer  union  between  the  different  elements 
of  society.  Normans  and  English  were  fused  by  the  ardor  of  a 
common  patriotic  enthusiasm  into  a  single  people.  The  real 
national  life  of  England  dates  from  this  time.  (For  the  effects 
of  the  war  on  France,  see  p.  494.) 


The  Wars  of  the  Roses  (145  5-1485). 

General  Statement.  —  The  Wars  of  the  Roses  is  the  name 
given  to  a  long,  shameful,  and  selfish  contest  between  the  adher- 
ents of  the  Houses  of  York  and  Lancaster,  rival  branches  of  the 
royal  family  of  England.  The  strife,  which  was  for  place  and 
power,  was  so  named  because  the  Yorkists  adopted  as  their  badge 
a  white  rose  and  the  Lancastrians  a  red  one. 

The  battle  of  Bosworth  Field  (1485)  marks  the  close  of  the 
war.  In  this  fight  King  Richard  III.,  the  last  of  the  House  of 
York,  was  overthrown  and  slain  by  Henry  Tudor,  the  Earl  of  Rich- 
mond, who  was  crowned  on  the  field  with  the  diadem  which  had 
fallen  from  the  head  of  Richard,  and  saluted  as  King  Henry  VII., 
the  first  of  the  Tudors. 

The  Effects  of  the  War.  —  The  most  important  result  of  the 
Wars  of  the  Roses  was  the  ruin  of  the  baronage  of  England.  One- 
half  of  the  nobility  was  slain.  Those  that  survived  were  ruined, 
their  estates  having  been  wasted  or  confiscated  during  the  progress 
of  the  struggle.  Not  a  single  great  house  retained  its  old-time 
wealth  and  influence. 

The  second  result  of  the  struggle  sprung  from  the  first.  This 
was  the  great  peril  into  which  English  liberty  was  cast  by  the  ruin 
of  the  nobility.  It  will  be  recalled  that  it  was  the  barons  who 
forced  the  Great  Charter  from  King  John  (see  p.  479),  and  who 
kept  him  and  his  successors  from  reigning  like  absolute  monarchs. 
Now  that  once  proud  and  powerful  baronage  were  ruined,  and 
their  confiscated  estates  had  gone  to  increase  the  influence  and 


GROWTH  OF   THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE.  489 

patronage  of  the  king.  He  being  no  longer  in  wholesome  fear  of 
Parliament,  for  the  Commons  were  as  yet  weak  and  timid,  did 
pretty  much  as  he  pleased,  and  became  insufferably  oppressive 
and  tyrannical  j  raising  taxes,  for  instance,  without  the  consent  of 
Parliament,  and  imprisoning  and  executing  persons  without  due 
process  of  law.  For  the  hundred  years  following  the  Wars  of  the 
Roses  the  government  of  England  was  rather  an  absolute  than  a 
limited  monarchy.  Not  until  the  final  Revolution  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  (see  Chap.  LV.)  did  the  people,  by  overturning  the 
throne  of  the  Stuarts,  fully  recover  their  lost  liberties. 

Growth  of  the  English  Language  and  Literature. 

The  Language.  —  From  the  Norman  Conquest  to  the  middle 
of  the  fourteenth  century  there  were  in  use  in  England  three  lan- 
guages :  Norman  French  was  the  speech  of  the  conquerors  and 
the  medium  of  polite  literature ;  Old  English  was  the  tongue  of 
the  common  people  ;  while  Latin  was  the  language  of  the  laws  and 
records,  of  the  church  services,  and  of  the  works  of  the  learned. 

Modern  English  is  the  Old  English  worn  and  improved  by 
use,  and  enriched  by  a  large  infusion  of  Norman- French  words, 
with  less  important  additions  from  the  Latin  and  other  languages. 
It  took  the  place  of  the  Norman-French  in  the  courts  of  law 
about  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century.  At  this  time  the 
language  was  broken  up  into  many  dialects,  and  the  expression 
"  King's  English "  is  supposed  to  have  referred  to  the  standard 
form  employed  in  state  documents  and  in  use  at  court. 

Effect  of  the  Norman  Conqnest  on  English  Literature.  —  The 
blow  that  struck  down  King  Harold  and  his  brave  thanes  on 
the  field  of  Hastings  silenced  for  the  space  of  about  a  century 
the  voice  of  English  literature.  The  tongue  of  the  conquerors 
became  the  speech  of  the  court,  the  nobility,  and  the  clergy; 
while  the  language  of  the  despised  English  was,  like  themselves, 
crowded  out  of  every  place  of  honor.  But  when,  after  a  few 
generations,  the  down-trodden  race  began  to  re-assert  itself,  Eng- 


490 


GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 


lish  literature  emerged  from  its  obscurity,  and  with  an  utterance 
somewhat  changed  — yet  it  is  unmistakably  the  same  voice  — 
resumes  its  interrupted  lesson  and  its  broken  song. 

Chaucer  (1328? -1400). —  Holding  a  position  high  above  all 
other  writers  of  early  English  is  Geoffrey  Chaucer.  He  is  the 
first  in  time,  and,  after  Shakespeare,  perhaps  the  first  in  genius, 
among   the   great   poets   of  the    English-speaking   race.     He   is 

reverently  called 
the  "  Father  of 
English  Poetry." 

Chaucer  stands 
between  two  ages, 
the  mediaeval  and 
the  modern.  He 
felt  not  only  the 
influences  of  the 
age  of  Feudalism 
which  was  passing 
away,  but  also 
those  of  the  new 
age  of  learn- 
ing and  freedom 
which  was  dawn- 
ing. It  is  because 
he  reflects  his  sur- 
roundings so  faith- 
fully in  his  writings, 
that  these  are  so 
valuable  as  inter- 
preters of  the  period  in  which  he  lived.  Chaucer's  greatest  work 
is  his  Canterbury  Tales,  wherein  the  poet  represents  himself  as  one 
of  a  company  of  story-telling  pilgrims  who  have  set  out  from  Lon- 
don on  a  journey  to  the  tomb  of  Thomas  Becket,  at  Canterbury. 

Wycliffe  and  the  Reformation  (1324- 13 84). —  Foremost  among 
the  reformers  and  religious  writers  of  the  period  under  review  was 


STATUE   OF    WYCLIFFE, 
(From  the  Luther  Monument  at  Worms.) 


FRANCE.  491 

Wycliffe,  "  The  Morning  Star  of  the  Reformation."  He  gave  the 
English  people  the  first  translation  of  the  entire  Bible  in  their 
native  tongue.  There  was  no  press  at  that  time  to  multiply  edi- 
tions of  the  book,  but  by  means  of  manuscript  copies  it  was  widely 
circulated  and  read.  Its  influence  was  very  great,  and  from  its  ap- 
pearance maybe  dated  the  beginning  of  the  Reformation  in  England. 
The  followers  of  Wycliffe  became  known  as  "  Lollards  "  (bab- 
blers), a  term  applied  to  them  in  derision.  They  grew  to  be  very 
numerous,  and  threatened  by  their  excesses  and  imprudent  zeal 
the  peace  of  the  state.     They  were  finally  suppressed  by  force. 

2.   France. 

Beginning  of  the  French  Kingdom.  — The  kingdom  of  France 
begins  properly  with  the  accession  of  the  first  of  the  Capetian 
rulers,  late  in  the  tenth  century.  The  Merovingian  and  Carolin- 
gian  kings  were  simply  German  princes  reigning  in  Gaul.  The 
Capetians  held  the  throne  for  more  than  three  centuries,  when 
they  were  followed  by  the  Valois  kings.  The  last  of  the  main 
line  of  the  Valois  family  gave  way  to  the  first  of  the  Valois-Orleans 
sovereigns  in  1498,  which  date  may  be  allowed  to  mark  the  be- 
ginning of  modern  French  history. 

We  shall  now  direct  attention  to  the  most  important  transac- 
tions of  the  period  covered  by  the  Capetian  and  Valois  dynasties. 
Our  aim  will  be  to  give  prominence  to  those  matters  which  con- 
cern the  gradual  consolidation  of  the  French  monarchy. 

France  under  the  Capetians1  (987-1328). 
The  first  Capetian  king  differed  from  his  vassal  counts  and  dukes 
simply  in  having  a  more  dignified  title ;  his  power  was  scarcely 


1  Table  of  the  Capetian  Kings :  — 
Hugh  Capet  (the  Great)   .     987-  996 
Robert  II.  (the  Sage)  .     .     996-1031 

Henry  1 1031-1060 

Philip  1 1060-1108 

Louis  VI.  (the  Fat)  .  .  .  1108-1137 
Louis  VII.  (the  Young)  .  1137-1180 
Philip  II.  (Augustus)    .     .   1 180-1223 


LouisVIII.  (Lion-hearted)  1223-1226 
Louis  IX.  (the  Saint)  .  .  1226-1270 
Philip  III.  (the  Hardy)  .  1280-1285 
Philip  IV.  (the  Fair)  .  .  1285-1314 
Louis  X.  (the  Stubborn)  .  1314-1316 
Philip  V.  (the  Tall)  .  .  1316-1322 
Charles  IV.(the  Handsome)  1322-1328 


492  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

greater  than  that  of  many  of  the  lords  who  paid  him  homage  as 
their  suzerain.  The  fourth  king  of  the  line  (Philip  I.)  confessed 
that  he  had  grown  gray  while  trying  to  capture  a  castle  which 
stood  within  sight  of  Paris ;  and  evidently  he  had  abandoned  all 
hope  of  getting  possession  of  it,  for  he  charged  his  son,  to  whom 
he  one  day  pointed  it  out,  to  watch  it  well.  Plow  various  events 
and  circumstances  —  conquests,  treaties,  politic  marriage  alliances, 
and  unjust  encroachments  —  conspired  to  build  up  the  power  of 
the  kings  will  appear  as  we  go  on. 

The  most  noteworthy  events  of  the  Capetian  period  were  the 
acquisition  by  the  French  crown  of  the  English  possessions  in 
France,  the  Holy  Wars  for  the  recovery  of  Jerusalem,  the  crusade 
against  the  Albigenses,  and  the  creation  of  the  States-General.  Of 
these  several  matters  we  will  now  speak  in  order. 

The  English  Possessions  in  France.  — The  issue  of  the  battle 
of  Hastings,  in  1066,  made  William  of  Normandy  king  of  England. 
He  ruled  that  country  by  right  of  conquest.  But  we  must  bear  in 
mind  that  he  still  held  his  possessions  in  France  as  a  fief  from  the 
French  king,  whose  vassal  he  was.  This  was  the  beginning  of  the 
possessions  on  the  continent  of  the  English  kings.  Then,  when 
Henry,  Count  of  Anjou,  came  to  the  English  throne  as  the  first  of 
the  Plantagenets,  these  territories  were  greatly  increased  by  the 
French  possessions  of  that  prince.  The  larger  part  of  Henry's 
dominions,  indeed,  was  in  France,  almost  the  whole  of  the  west- 
ern coast  of  the  country  being  in  his  hands  ;  but  for  all  of  this  he, 
of  course,  paid  homage  to  the  French  king. 

As  was  inevitable,  a  feeling  of  intense  jealousy  sprang  up  be- 
tween the  two  sovereigns.  The  French  king 'was  ever  watching 
for  some  pretext  upon  which  he  might  deprive  his  rival  of  his  pos- 
sessions in  France.  The  opportunity  came  when  King  John,  in 
1 199,  succeeded  Richard  the  Lion-hearted  upon  the  English 
throne.  That  odious  tyrant  was  accused,  and  doubtless  justly,  of 
having  murdered  his  nephew  Arthur.  Philip  Augustus,  who  then 
held  the  French  throne,  as  John's  feudal  superior,  ordered  him  to 
clear  himself  of  the  charge  before  his  French  peers.     John  refus- 


THE  FRENCH  AND    THE   CRUSADES.  493 

ing  to  do  so,  Philip  declared  forfeited  all  the  lands  he  held  as  fiefs 
of  the  French  Crown,1  and  thereupon  proceeded  to  seize  Normandy 
and  other  possessions  of  John  in  the  North  of  France,  leaving  him 
scarcely  anything  save  the  Duchy  of  Aquitaine  in  the  South.  The 
annexation  of  these  large  possessions  to  the  crown  of  France 
brought  a  vast  accession  of  power  and  patronage  to  the  king,  who 
was  now  easily  the  superior  of  any  of  his  great  vassals. 

The  French  and  the  Crusades.  — The  age  of  the  Capetians  was 
the  age  of  the  Crusades.  These  romantic  expeditions,  while  stir- 
ring all  Christendom,  appealed  especially  to  the  ardent,  imagina- 
tive genius  of  the  Gallic  race.  Three  Capetian  kings,  Louis  VII., 
Philip  Augustus,  and  Louis  IX.,  themselves  headed  several  of  the 
wild  expeditions. 

It  is  the  influence  of  the  Crusades  on  the  French  monarchy  that 
we  alone  need  to  notice  in  this  place.  They  tended  very  materi- 
ally to  weaken  the  power  and  influence  of  the  feudal  nobility,  and 
in  a  corresponding  degree  to  strengthen  the  authority  of  the  crown 
and  add  to  its  dignity.  The  way  in  which  they  brought  about  this 
transfer  of  power  from  the  aristocracy  to  the  king  has  been  ex- 
plained in  the  chapter  on  the  Crusades  (see  p.  450). 

Crusade  against  the  Albigenses  (1 207-1 229).  —  During  this 
age  of  religious  enthusiasm  holy  wars  were  directed  as  well  against 
heretics  as  infidels.  In  the  South  of  France  was  a  sect  of  Chris- 
tians called  Albigenses,2  who  had  departed  so  far  from  the  faith  of 
the  Church,  and  had  embraced  such  dangerous  social  heresies,  that 
Pope  Innocent  III.  felt  constrained  to  call  upon  the  French  king 
and  his  nobles  to  lead  a  crusade  against  them.  The  outcome  was 
the  almost  total  extirpation  of  the  heretical  sect,  and  the  acquisi- 
tion by  the  French  crown  of  large  and  rich  territories  that  were 

1  This  was  the  second  condemnation  of  John.  A  year  hefore  this  time  (in 
1202),  John  having  refused  to  answer  a  charge  of  tyranny  preferred  by  the 
nobles  of  Poitou,  Philip  had  declared  his  fief  to  be  forfeited.  It  was  in  the 
turmoil  which  followed  this  sentence,  that  Arthur  was  taken  prisoner  by  John 
and  afterwards  murdered. 

2  From  Albi,  the  name  of  a  city  and  district  in  which  their  tenets  prevailed. 


494  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

formerly  the  possessions  of  the  Counts  of  Toulouse,  the  patrons  of 
the  heretics. 

Creation  of  the  States-General  (1302).  —  The  event  of  the 
greatest  significance  in  the  Capetian  age  was  the  admission,  in  the 
reign  of  Philip  the  Fair,  of  the  commons  to  the  feudal  assembly, 
or  council,  of  the  king.  This  transaction  is  in  French  history 
what  the  first  summoning  of  the  House  of  Commons  is  in  Eng- 
lish (see  p.  480). 

A  dispute  having  arisen  between  Philip  and  the  Pope  respecting 
the  control  of  the  offices  and  revenues  of  the  French  Church,  in 
order  to  rally  to  his  support  all  classes  throughout  his  kingdom, 
Philip  called  an  assembly,  to  which  he  invited  representatives  of 
the  burghers,  or  inhabitants  of  the  cities  (1302).  The  royal 
council  had  hitherto  been  made  up  of  two  estates  only,  —  the 
nobles  and  the  clergy ;  now  is  added  what  comes  to  be  known  as 
the  Tiers  Etat,  or  Third  Estate,  and  henceforth  the  assembly  is 
known  as  the  States-  General.  Eventually,  before  the  power  of  this 
Third  Estate,  we  shall  see  the  Church,  the  nobility,  and  the  mon- 
archy all  go  down,  through  revolution ;  just  as  in  England  we  shall 
see  clergy,  nobles,  and  king  gradually  yield  to  the  rising  power  of 
the  English  Commons. 

France  under  the  House  of  Valois1  (1328-1498). 

Effects  npon  France  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War. —The 
chief  interest  of  that  period  of  French  history  upon  which  we 
here  enter  attaches  to  that  long  struggle  between  England  and 
France  known  as  the  Hundred  Years'  War.  Having  already,  in 
connection  with  English  affairs  (see  p.  484),  touched  upon  the 
causes  and  incidents  of  this  war,  we  shall  here  simply  speak  of 

1  Names  of  the  sovereigns  of  the  main  line  of  the  House  of  Valois :  — 

Philip  VI 1 328-1 350    Charles  VII.   (the  Victori- 

John  (the  Good)      .     .     .  1 350-1 364        ous) 1422-1461 

Charles  V.  (the  Wise)  .     .  1364-1380    Louis  XI 1461-1483 

Charles    VI.    (the    Well-  Charles   VIII.    (the   Affa- 

Beloved) 1380-1422        hie) 1483-1498 


LOUIS  XL   AND    CHARLES   THE   BOLD.  495 

the  effects  of  the  struggle  on  the  French  people  and  kingdom. 
Among  these  results  must  be  noticed  the  almost  complete  pros- 
tration, by  the  successive  shocks  of  Crecy,  Poitiers,  and  Agin- 
court,  of  the  French  feudal  aristocracy,  which  was  already  totter- 
ing to  its  fall  through  the  undermining  influences  of  the  Crusades ; 
the  growth  of  the  power  of  the  king,  a  consequence,  largely,  of 
the  ruin  of  the  nobility ;  and,  lastly,  the  awakening  of  a  feeling  of 
nationality,  and  the  drawing  together  of  the  hitherto  isolated  sec- 
tions of  the  country  by  the  attraction  of  a  common  and  patriotic 
enthusiasm. 

Speaking  in  a  very  general  manner,  we  may  say  that  by  the 
close  of  the  war  Feudalism  in  France  was  over,  and  that  France 
had  become,  partly  in  spite  of  the  war  but  more  largely  by  reason 
of  it,  not  only  a  great  monarchy,  but  a  great  nation. 

Louis  XI.  and  Charles  the  Bold  of  Burgundy.  — The  founda- 
tions of  the  French  monarchy  were  greatly  enlarged  and  strength- 
ened by  the  unscrupulous  measures  of  Louis  XI.  (1461-1483), 
who  was  a  perfect  Ulysses  in  cunning  and  deceit.  His  maxim 
was,  "  He  who  knows  how  to  deceive,  knows  how  to  reign."  The 
great  feudal  lords  that  still  retained  power  and  influence,  he 
brought  to  destruction  one  after  another,  and  united  their  fiefs  to 
the  royal  domains.  Of  all  the  vassal  nobles  ruined  by  the  craft 
and  cunning  of  Louis,  the  most  famous  and  powerful  was  Charles 
the  Bold,  Duke  of  Burgundy,  with  whom  the  French  king  was 
almost  constantly  warring,  and  against  whom  he  was  forever  in- 
triguing. Upon  the  death  of  the  duke,  Louis,  without  clear  right, 
seized  a  great  part  of  his  dominions,  which  were  almost  large  and 
rich  enough  to  sustain  the  dignity  of  a  king.  By  inheritance  and 
treaty,  Louis  also  gained  large  accessions  of  territory  in  the 
South  of  France,  which  gave  his  kingdom  a  wide  frontage 
upon  the  Mediterranean,  and  made  the  Pyrenees  its  southern 
defence. 

Invasion  of  Italy  by  Charles  VTH  —  Charles  VIII.,  the  son  of 
Louis  XL,  was  the  last  of  the  direct  line  of  the  Valois.  Through 
the  favor  of  a  long  series  of  circumstances,  the  persistent  policy  of 


4%  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

his  predecessors,  and  his  own  politic  marriage,1  he  found  himself 
at  the  head  of  a  state  that  had  been  gradually  transformed  from  a 
feudal  league  into  a  true  monarchy.  The  strength  of  this  kingdom 
he  determined  to  employ  in  some  enterprise  beyond  the  limits  of 
France.  With  a  standing  army,  created  by  Charles  VII.  during 
the  latter  years  of  the  war  with  England,2  at  his  -command,  he  in- 
vaded Italy,  intent  on  the  conquest  of  Naples,  —  to  which  he  laid 
claim  on  the  strength  of  some  old  bequest,  —  proposing,  with  that 
state  subdued,  to  lead  a  crusade  to  the  East  against  the  Turks. 
He  reached  Naples  in  triumph,  but  was  soon  forced,  with  heavy 
losses,  to  retreat  into  France. 

This  enterprise  of  Charles  is  noteworthy  not  only  because  it 
marks  the  commencement  of  a  long  series  of  brilliant  yet  disas- 
trous campaigns  carried  on  by  the  French  in  Italy,  but  also  on 
account  of  Charles'  army  having  been  made  up  largely  of  paid 
troops  instead  of  feudal  retainers,  which  fact  assures  us  that  the 
Feudal  System  in  France,  as  a  governmental  organization,  had  come 
to  an  end. 

Beginnings  of  French  Literature. 

The  Troubadours.  —  The  contact  of  the  old  Latin  speech  in 
Gaul  with  that  of  the  Teutonic  invaders  gave  rise  there  to  two 
very  distinct  dialects.  These  were  the  Langue  d}  Oc,  or  Proven- 
cal, the  tongue  of  the  South  of  France  and  of  the  adjoining  regions 
of  Spain  and  Italy ;  and  the  Langue  d1  Oil,  or  French  proper,  the 
language  of  the  North.3 

1  He  married  Anne  of  Brittany,  and  thus  brought  that  large  province,  which 
had  hitherto  constituted  an  almost  independent  state,  under  the  authority  of 
the  French  crown. 

2  The  paid  force  of  infantry  and  cavalry  created  by  Charles  VII.  in  1448, 
was  the  first  standing  army  in  Europe,  and  the  beginning  of  that  vast  military 
system  which  now  burdens  the  great  nations  of  that  continent  with  the  sup- 
port of  several  millions  of  soldiers  constantly  under  arms. 

3  The  terms  Langue  a"  Oc  and  Langue  d^  Oil  arose  from  the  use  of  different 
words  for  yes,  which  in  the  tongue  of  the  South  was  oc,  and  in  that  of  the 
North  oil. 


THE    TROUVEURS.  497 

About  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  century,  by  which  time  the 
Provencal  tongue  had  become  settled  and  somewhat  polished,  liter- 
ature in  France  first  began  to  find  a  voice  in  the  songs  of  the  Trou- 
badours, the  poets  of  the  South.  It  is  instructive  to  note  that  it 
was  the  home  of  the  Albigensian  heresy,  the  land  that  had  felt  the 
influence  of  every  Mediterranean  civilization,  that  was  also  the  home 
of  the  Troubadour  literature.  The  Counts  of  Toulouse,  the  pro- 
tectors of  the  heretics,  were  also  the  patrons  of  the  poets.  The 
same  fierce  persecution  that  uprooted  the  heretical  faith  of  the 
Albigenses,  also  stilled  the  song  of  the  Troubadours  (see  p.  493). 

The  verses  of  the  Troubadours  were  sung  in  every  land,  and  to 
the  stimulating  influence  of  their  musical  harmonies  the  early 
poetry  of  almost  every  people  of  Europe  is  largely  indebted. 

The  TroHveurs.  —  These  were  the  poets  of  Northern  France, 
who  composed  in  the  Langue  d'  Oil,  or  Old  French  tongue.  They 
flourished  during  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries.  While  the 
compositions  of  the  Troubadours  were  almost  exclusively  lyrical 
songs,  those  of  the  Trouveurs  were  epic,  or  narrative  poems,  called 
romances.  They  gather  about  three  great  names,  —  King  Arthur, 
Alexander  the  Great,  and  Charlemagne.  It  will  be  noted  that  the 
poet  story-tellers  thus  drew  their  material  from  the  heroic  legends 
of  all  the  different  races  that  blended  to  form  the  French  nation, 
namely,  the  Celtic,  the  Graeco-Roman,  and  the  Teutonic. 

The  influence  of  these  French  romances  upon  the  springing  lit- 
eratures of  Europe  was  most  inspiring  and  helpful.  Nor  has  their 
influence  yet  ceased.  Thus  in  English  literature,  not  only  did 
Chaucer  and  Spenser  and  all  the  early  island-poets  draw  inspiration 
from  these  fountains  of  continental  song,  but  the  later  Tennyson, 
in  his  Idylls  of  the  King,  has  illustrated  the  power  over  the  imagina- 
tion yet  possessed  by  the  Arthurian  poems  of  the  old  Trouveurs. 

Froissart's  Chronicles.  —  The  first  really  noted  prose  writer  in 
French  literature  was  Froissart  (1337-1410),  whose  entertain- 
ing credulity  and  artlessness,  and  skill  as  a  story-teller,  have  won 
for  him  the  title  of  the  French  Herodotus.  Born,  as  he  was,  only 
a  little  after  the  opening  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War,  and  know- 


498  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

ing  personally  many  of  the  actors  in  that  struggle,  it  was  fitting 
that  he  should  become,  as  he  did,  the  annalist  of  those  stirring  times. 

3.   Spain. 

The  Beginnings  of  Spain.  —  When,  in  the  eighth  century,  the 
Saracens  swept  like  a  wave  over  Spain,  the  mountains  of  Asturia, 
in  the  northwest  corner  of  the  peninsula,  afforded  a  refuge  for 
the  most  resolute  of  the  Christian  chiefs  who  refused  to  submit 
their  necks  to  the  Moslem  yoke.  These  brave  and  hardy  war- 
riors not  only  successfully  defended  the  hilly  districts  that  formed 
their  retreat,  but  gradually  pushed  back  the  invaders,  and  regained 
control  of  a  portion  of  the  fields  and  cities  that  had  been  lost. 
This  work  of  reconquest  was  greatly  furthered  by  Charlemagne, 
who,  it  will  be  recalled,  drove  the  Saracens  out  of  all  the  north- 
eastern portion  of  the  country  as  far  south  as  the  Ebro,  and  made 
the  subjugated  district  a  province  of  his  great  empire,  under  the 
name  of  the  Spanish  March. 

By  the  opening  of  the  eleventh  century  several  little  Christian 
states,  among  which  we  must  notice  the  names  of  Castile  and  Ara- 
gon,  because  of  the  prominent  part  they  were  to  play  in  later 
history,  had  been  established  upon  the  ground  thus  recovered  or 
always  maintained.  Castile  was  at  first  simply  "  a  line  of  castles  " 
against  the  Moors,  whence  its  name. 

Union  of  Castile  and  Aragon  (1479).  —  For  several  centuries 
the  princes  of  the  little  states  to  which  we  have  referred  kept  up 
an  incessant  warfare  with  their  Mohammedan  neighbors ;  owing 
however  to  dissensions  among  themselves,  they  were  unable  to 
combine  in  any  effective  way  for  the  reconquest  of  their  ancient 
possessions.  But  the  marriage,  in  1469,  of  Ferdinand,  prince  of 
Aragon,  to  Isabella,  princess  of  Castile,  paved  the  way  for  the 
union  a  little  later  of  these  two  leading  states.  Thus  the  quarrels 
of  these  rival  principalities  were  composed,  and  they  were  now  free 
to  employ  their  united  strength  in  effecting  what  the  Christian 
princes  amidst  all  their  contentions  had  never  lost  sight  of,  —  the 
expulsion  of  the  Moors  from  the  peninsula. 


THE    CONQUEST   OF  GRANADA. 


499 


The  Conquest  of  Granada  (1492). — At  the  time  when  the 
basis  of  the  Spanish  monarchy  was  laid  by  the  union  of  Castile  and 
Aragon,  the  Mohammedan  possessions  had  been  reduced,  by  the 
constant  pressure  of  the  Christian  chiefs  through  eight  centuries, 
to  a  very  limited  dominion  in  the  south  of  Spain.  Here  the 
Moors  had  established  a  strong,  well-compacted  state,  known  as 
the  Kingdom  of  Granada. 

As  soon  as  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  had  settled  the  affairs  of 
their  dominions,  they  began  to  make  preparation  for  the  con- 
quest of  Granada,  eager  to  signalize  their  reign  by  the  reduction 


THE   ALHAMBRA. 


PALACE  OF  THE   MOORISH    KINGS  AT  GRANADA. 
(From  a  photograph.) 


of  this  last  stronghold  of  the  Moorish  power  in  the  peninsula. 
The  Moors  made  a  desperate  defence  of  their  little  state.  The 
struggle  lasted  for  ten  years.  City  after  city  fell  into  the  hands  of 
the  Christian  knights,  and  finally  the  capital,  Granada,  pressed  by 
an  army  of  seventy  thousand,  was  forced  to  surrender,  and  the 
Cross  replaced  the  Crescent  on  its  walls  and  towers  (1492).  The 
Moors,  or  Moriscoes,  as  they  were  called,  were  allowed  to  remain 
in  the  country  and  to  retain  their  Mohammedan  worship,  though 
under  many  annoying  restrictions.  What  is  known  as  their  expul- 
sion occurred  at  a  later  date  (see  p.  538). 


500  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

The  fall  of  Granada  holds  an  important  place  among  the  many 
significant  events  that  mark  the  latter  half  of  the  fifteenth  century. 
It  ended,  after  an  existence  of  eight  hundred  years,  the  Moham- 
medan kingdom  in  the  Spanish  peninsula,  and  thus  formed  an 
offset  to  the  progress  of  the  Moslem  power  in  Eastern  Europe  and 
the  loss  to  the  Christian  world  of  Constantinople.  It  advanced 
Spain  to  the  first  rank  among  the  nations  of  Europe,  and  gave  her 
arms  a  prestige  that  secured  for  her  position,  influence,  and  defer- 
ence long  after  the  decline  of  her  power  had  commenced. 

The  Inquisition.  —  Ferdinand  greatly  enhanced  his  power  by  the 
active  and  tyrannical  use  of  the  Inquisition,  a  court  that  had  been 
established  by  the  Church  for  the  purpose  of  detecting  and  punish- 
ing heresy.  The  chief  victims  of  the  tribunal  were  the  Moors  and 
Jews,  but  it  was  also  directed  against  the  enemies  of  the  sovereign 
among  the  nobility  and  the  clergy.  The  Holy  Office,  as  the 
tribunal  was  styled,  thus  became  the  instrument  of  the  most 
incredible  cruelty.  Thousands  were  burned  at  the  stake,  and  tens 
of  thousands  more  condemned  to  endure  penalties  scarcely  less 
terrible.  Queen  Isabella,  in  giving  her  consent  to  the  establish- 
ment of  the  tribunal  in  her  dominions,  was  doubtless  actuated  by 
the  purest  religious  zeal,  and  sincerely  believed  that  in  suppress- 
ing heresy  she  was  discharging  a  simple  duty,  and  rendering  God 
good  service.  "  In  the  love  of  Christ  and  his  Maid- Mother,"  she 
says,  "  I  have  caused  great  misery.  I  have  depopulated  towns 
and  districts,  provinces  and  kingdoms." 

Death  of  Ferdinand  and  of  Isabella.  —  Queen  Isabella  died  in 
1504,  and  Ferdinand  followed  her  in  the  year  15 16,  upon  which 
latter  event  the  crown  of  Spain  descended  upon  the  head  of  his 
grandson,  Charles,  of  whom  we  shall  hear  much  as  Emperor 
Charles  V.     With  his  reign  the  modern  history  of  Spain  begins. 

Beginnings  of  the  Spanish  Language  and  Literature. 

The  Language.  —  After  the  union  of  Castile  and  Aragon  it  was 
the  language  of  the  former  that  became  the  speech  of  the  Spanish 
court.     During  the  reign  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  it  gradually 


THE  POEM  OF  THE   CID. 


*501 


gained  the  ascendancy  over  the  numerous  dialects  of  the  country, 
and  became  the  national  speech,  just  as  in  France  the  Langue 
d'Oil  finally  crowded  out  all  other  dialects.  By  the  conquests  and 
colonizations  of  the  sixteenth  century  this  Castilian  speech  was  des- 
tined to  become  only  less  widely  spread  than  the  English  tongue. 
The  Poem  of  the  Cid.  —  Castilian,  or  Spanish  literature  begins 
in  the  twelfth  century  with  the  romance-poem  of  the  Cid  (that  is, 
Chief,  the  title  of  the  hero  of  the  poem),  one  of  the  great  literary 
productions  of  the  mediaeval  period.  This  grand  national  poem 
was  the  outgrowth  of  the  sentiments  inspired  by  the  long  struggle 
between  the  Spanish  Christians  and  the  Mohammedan  Moors. 


SARCOPHAGUS   OF    FERDINAND   AND    ISABELLA,    AT   GRANADA. 
(From  a  photograph.) 


4.    Germany. 

Beginnings  of  the  Kingdom  of  Germany.  —  The  history  of 
Germany  as  a  separate  kingdom  begins  with  the  break-up  of  the 
empire  of  Charlemagne  (see  p.  408).  Germany  at  that  time  com- 
prised several  groups  of  tribes,  —  the  Saxons,  the  Suabians,  the 
Thuringians,  the  Bavarians,  and  the  Franks.  Closely  allied  in 
race,  speech,  manners,  and  social  arrangements,  all  these  peoples 
seemed  ready  to  be  welded  into  a  close  and  firm  nation ;  but,  un- 


502*  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS.     - 

fortunately,  the  circumstances  tending  to  keep  the  several  states  or 
communities  apart  were  stronger  than  those  operating  to  draw 
them  together,  so  that  for  a  thousand  years  after  Charlemagne  we 
find  them  constituting  hardly  anything  more  than  a  very  loose  con- 
federation, the  members  of  which  were  constantly  struggling 
among  themselves  for  supremacy,  or  were  engaged  in  private  wars 
with  the  neighboring  nations.1 

That  which  more  than  all  else  operated  to  prevent  Germany 
from  becoming  a  powerful,  closely-knit  nation,  was  the  adoption 
by  the  German  rulers  of  an  unfortunate  policy  respecting  a  world- 
empire.    This  matter  will  be  explained  in  the  following  paragraphs. 

Renewal  of  the  Roman  Empire  by  Otto  the  Great  (962). — 
When  the  dominions  of  Charlemagne  were  divided  among  his 
three  grandsons  (see  p.  408),  the  Imperial  title  was  given  to 
Lothair,  to  whom  fell  Italy  and  the  Rhine-land.  The  title,  how- 
ever, meant  scarcely  anything,  carrying  with  it  little  or  no  real 
authority.  Thus  matters  ran  on  for  more  than  a  century,  the 
empty  honor  of  the  title  sometimes  being  enjoyed  by  the  kings 
of  Italy,  and  again  by  those  of  Germany. 

But  with  the  accession  of  the  second  of  the  Saxon  line,  Otto  I., 
who  was  crowned  king  at  Aachen  in  936,  there  appeared  among 
the  princes  of  Europe  a  second  Charlemagne.  He  was  easily  first 
among  them  all.  Besides  being  king  of  Germany,  he  became, 
through  interference  on  request  in  the  affairs  of  Italy,  king  of  that 
country  also.  Furthermore,  he  wrested  large  tracts  of  land  from 
the  Slavonians,  and  forced  the  Danes,  Poles,  and  Hungarians  to 
acknowledge  his  suzerainty.     Thus  favored  by  fortune,  he  natur- 

1  During  the  mediaeval  period,  Germany  was  under  the  following  lines  of 
kings  and  emperors :  — 


Carolingians 843-  911 

Conrad  of  Franconia     .     .  911-  918 

Saxon  Emperors       .     .     .  919-1024 

Franconian  Emperors  .     .  1024-1125 

Lothair  of  Saxony    .     .     .  1125-1137 

Hohenstaufen  Emperors  .  1 138-1254 


The  Interregnum  .  .  .  1254- 1273 
Emperors   of  different 

Houses 1 273-1438 

Emperors  of  the  House  of 

Austria 1438- 


REVIVAL    OF  THE  EMPIRE.  503 

ally  conceived  the  idea  of  restoring  once  more  the  Roman  empire, 
even  as  it  had  been  revived  by  Charles  the  Great  (see  p.  406). 

So  in  962,  just  a  little  more  than  a  century  and  a  half  after  the 
coronation  at  Rome  of  Charlemagne  as  emperor,  Otto,  at  the 
same  place  and  by  the  same  papal  authority,  was  crowned  Emperor 
of  the  Romans.  For  a  generation  no  one  had  borne  the  title. 
From  this  time  on  it  was  the  rule  that  the  German  king  who  was 
crowned  at  Aachen  had  a  right  to  be  crowned  king  of  Italy  at 
Milan,  and  emperor  at  Rome  (Freeman).  Thus  three  crowns, 
and  in  time  still  more,  came  to  be  heaped  upon  a  single  head. 

Consequences  to  Germany  of  the  Revival  of  the  Empire.  — 
The  scheme  of  Otto  respecting  a  world-empire  was  a  grand  one, 
but,  as  had  been  demonstrated  by  the  failure  of  the  attempt  of 
Charlemagne,  was  an  utterly  impracticable  idea.  It  was  simply  a 
dream,  and  never  became  anything  more  than  a  ghostly  shadow. 
Yet  the  pursuit  of  this  phantom  by  the  German  kings  resulted  in 
the  most  woeful  consequences  to  Germany.  Trying  to  grasp  too 
much,  these  rulers  seized  nothing  at  all.  Attempting  to  be  em- 
perors of  the  world,  they  failed  to  become  even  kings  of  Germany. 
While  engaged  in  their  schemes  of  foreign  conquest,  their  home 
affairs  were  neglected,  and  their  vassals  succeeded  in  increasing 
their  power  and  making  it  hereditary.  Thus  while  the  kings  of 
England,  France,  and  Spain  were  gradually  consolidating  their 
dominions,  and  building  up  strong  centralized  monarchies  on  the 
ruins  of  Feudalism,  the  sovereigns  of  Germany,  neglecting  the 
affairs  of  their  own  kingdom,  were  allowing  it  to  become  split  up 
into  a  vast  number  of  virtually  independent  states,  the  ambitions 
and  jealousies  of  whose  rulers  were  to  postpone  the  unification  of 
Germany  for  four  or  five  hundred  years  —  until  our  own  day. 

Had  the  emperors  inflicted  loss  and  disaster  upon  Germany 
alone  though  their  pursuit  of  this  phantom,  the  case  would  not  be 
so  lamentable ;  but  Italy  was  made  the  camping  field  of  the 
Imperial  armies,  and  the  whole  peninsula  kept  distracted  with  the 
bitter  quarrels  of  Guelphs  and  Ghibellines  (see  p.  504),  and  thus  the 
nationalization  of  the  Italian  people  was  also  delayed  for  centuries. 


504  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

Germany  received  just  one  positive  compensation  for  all  this 
loss  accruing  from  the  ambition  of  her  kings.  This  was  the  gift 
of  Italian  civilization,  which  came  into  the  country  through  the 
connections  of  the  emperors  with  the  peninsula. 

Germany  under  the  Hohenstaufen  Emperors  (113 8- 1254). — 
The  Hohenstaufen,  or  Suabian  dynasty  was  a  most  notable  line  of 
emperors.  The  matter  of  chief  importance  in  German  history 
under  the  Hohenstaufen  is  the  long  and  bitter  conflict,  begun  gen- 
erations before,  that  was  waged  between  them  and  the  Popes  (see 
p.  455).  Germany  and  Italy  were  divided  into  two  great  parties, 
known  as  Welfs  and  Waiblings,  or,  as  designated  in  Italy,  Guelphs 
and  Ghibellines,  the  former  adhering  to  the  Pope,  the  latter  to  the 
Emperor.  The  issue  of  a  century's  contention  was  the  complete 
ruin  of  the  House  of  Hohenstaufen. 

The  most  noted  ruler  of  the  line  was  Frederick  I.  (1152-1190), 
better  known  as  Frederick  Barbarossa,  from  his  red  beard.  He 
gave  Germany  a  good  and  strong  government,  and  gained  a  sure 
place  in  the  affections  of  the  German  people,  who  came  to  regard 
him  as  the  representative  of  the  sentiment  of  German  nationality. 
When  news  of  his  death  was  brought  back  from  the  East,  —  it  will 
be  recalled  that  he  took  part  in  the  Third  Crusade,  and  lost  his 
life  in  Asia  Minor  (see  p.  445),  —  they  refused  to  believe  that  he 
was  dead,  and,  as  time  passed,  a  tradition  arose  which  told  how  he 
slept  in  a  cavern  beneath  one  of  his  castles  on  a  mountain-top,  and 
how,  when  the  ravens  should  cease  to  circle  about  the  hill,  he  would 
appear,  to  make  the  German  people  a  nation  united  and  strong. 

Frederick  Barbarossa  was  followed  by  his  son  Henry  VI.  (1190- 
1197),  who,  by  marriage,  had  acquired  a  claim  to  the  kingdom  of 
Sicily.1    Almost  all  his  time  and  resources  were  spent  in  reducing 

1  The  Hohenstaufen  held  the  kingdom  until  1265,  when  the  Pope  gave  it 
as  a  fief  to  Charles  I.  of  Anjou  (brother  of  Louis  IX.  of  France),  who  beheaded 
the  rightful  heir,  the  ill-starred  boy  Conradin,  the  last  of  the  Hohenstaufen 
race  (1268).  Charles'  oppressive  rule  led  to  a  revolt  of  his  island  subjects, 
and  to  the  great  massacre  known  as  the  Sicilian  Vespers  (1282).  All  of  the 
hated  race  of  Frenchmen  were  either  killed  or  driven  out  of  the  island. 


CA  THEDRAL-B  UILDING.  505 

that  remote  realm  to  a  state  of  proper  subjection  to  his  authority. 
By  thus  leading  the  emperors  to  neglect  their  German  subjects  and 
interests,  this  southern  kingdom  proved  a  fatal  dower  to  the  Suabian 
house. 

By  the  close  of  the  Hohenstaufen  period,  Germany  was  divided 
into  two  hundred  and  seventy-six  virtually  independent  states,  the 
princes  and  nobles  having  taken  advantage  of  the  prolonged  ab- 
sences of  the  emperors,  or  their  troubles  with  the  Popes,  to  free 
themselves  almost  completely  from  the  control  of  the  crown.  There 
was  really  no  longer  either  a  German  kingdom  or  a  Roman  empire. 

Cathedral-building.  —  The  age  of  the  Hohenstaufen  was  the 
age  of  the  Crusades,  which  is  to  say  that  it  was  the  age  of  religious 
faith.  The  most  striking  expression  of  the  spirit  of  the  period,  if 
we  except  the  Holy  Wars,  is  to  be  found  in  the  sacred  architecture 
of  the  time.  The  style  of  architecture  first  employed  was  the 
Romanesque,  characterized  by  the  rounded  arch  and  the  dome ; 
but  towards  the  close  of  the  twelfth  century  this  was  superseded  by 
the  Gothic,  distinguished  by  the  pointed  arch,  the  tower  or  the 
slender  spire,  and  rich  ornamentation. 

The  enthusiasm  for  church-building  was  universal  throughout 
Europe  ;  yet  nowhere  did  it  find  nobler  or  more  sustained  expres- 
sion than  in  Germany.  Among  the  most  noted  of  the  German 
cathedrals  are  the  one  at  Strasburg,  begun  in  the  eleventh  century, 
and  that  at  Cologne,  commenced  in  1 248,  but  not  wholly  finished 
until  our  own  day  (in  1880). 

Rise  of  the  Swiss  Republic.  —  The  most  noteworthy  matters  in 
German  history  during  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries,  are 
the  struggles  between  the  Swiss  and  the  dukes  of  Austria;  the 
religious  movement  of  the  Hussites;  and  the  growing  power  of 
the  House  of  Austria. 

From  early  in  the  eleventh  century,  the  country  now  known  as 
Switzerland  was  a  part  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire ;  but  its  lib- 
erty-loving people  never  acknowledged  any  man  as  their  master, 
save  the  German  emperor,  to  whom  they  yielded  a  merely  nomi- 
nal obedience.    The   dukes   of  Austria,  princes   of  the  empire, 


506  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

laid  claim  to  a  certain  authority  over  them,  and  tried  to  make 
themselves  masters  in  Switzerland.  This  led  to  a  memorable 
struggle  between  the  dukes  and  the  brave  mountaineers.  To  the 
early  part  of  the  contest  belongs  the  legend  of  William  Tell,  which 
historical  criticism  now  pronounces  a  myth,  with  nothing  but  the 
revolt  as  the  nucleus  of  fact. 

In  1 3 15,  at  the  noted  battle  of  Morgarten  Pass,  the  Austrians 
suffered  a  severe  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the  Swiss  patriots.  Later 
in  the  same  century,  the  Austrians  sustained  another  defeat  on  the 
memorable  field  of  Sempach  (1386).  It  was  here,  tradition  says, 
that  Arnold  of  Winkelried  broke  the  ranks  of  the  Austrians,  by 
collecting  in  his  arms  as  many  of  their  lances  as  he  could,  and,  as 
they  pierced  his  breast,  bearing  them  with  him  to  the  ground, 
exclaiming,  "  Comrades,  I  will  open  a  road  for  you." 

Shortly  after  the  battle  of  Sempach,  the  Eidgenossen,  or  Con- 
federates, as  the  Swiss  were  at  this  time  called,  gained  another 
victory  over  the  Austrians  at  Wafels  (1388),  which  placed  on  a 
firm  basis  the  growing  power  of  the  League. 

The  Hussites.  —  About  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century, 
the  doctrines  of  the  English  reformer,  WyclirTe  (see  p.  490)  began 
to  spread  in  Bohemia.  The  chief  of  the  new  sect  was  John  Huss, 
a  professor  of  the  University  of  Prague.  The  doctrines  of  the 
reformer  were  condemned  by  the  great  Council  of  Constance,  and 
Huss  himself,  having  been  delivered  over  into  the  hands  of  the 
civil  authorities  for  punishment,  was  burned  at  the  stake  (1415). 
The  following  year  Jerome  of  Prague,  another  reformer,  was  like- 
wise burned. 

Shortly  after  the  burning  of  Huss  a  crusade  was  proclaimed 
against  his  followers,  who  had  risen  in  arms.  Then  began  a  cruel, 
desolating  war  of  fifteen  years,  the  outcome  of  which  was  the 
almost  total  extermination  of  the  radical  party  among  the  Hussites. 
With  the  more  moderate  of  the  reformers,  however,  a  treaty  was 
made  which  secured  them  freedom  of  worship. 

The  Imperial  Crown  becomes  Hereditary  in  the  House  of 
Austria  (1438).  —  In  the  year  1438,  Albert,  Duke  of  Austria, 


THE  IMPERIAL    CROWN. 


507 


was  raised  by  the  Electors 1  to  the  Imperial  throne.  His  accession 
marks  an  epoch  in  German  history,  for  from  this  time  until  the 
dissolution  of  the  empire  by  Napoleon  in  1806,  the  Imperial 
crown  was  regarded  as  hereditary  in 
the  Hapsburg2  family,  the  Electors, 
although  never  failing  to  go  through 
the  formality  of  an  election,  almost 
always  choosing  one  of  the  members 
of  that  house  as  king. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  practi- 
cally uninterrupted  succession  upon 
the  Imperial  throne  of  the  princes  of 
the  House  of  Austria,  up  to  the  close 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  the  power  and 
importance  of  the  family  steadily  in- 
creased, until  it  seemed  that  Austria 
would  overshadow  all  the  other  Ger- 
man states,  and  subject  them  to  her 
sway ;  would,  in  a  word,  become  Ger- 
many, just  as  Francia  in  Gaul  had 
become  France.  But  this,  as  we  shall 
learn,  never  came  about. 

The  greatest  of  the  Hapsburg  line 
during  the  mediaeval  period  was  Maxi- 
milian I.  ( 1493-15 19).  His  reign  is  in  every  way  a  noteworthy  one 
in  ( ierman  history,  marking,  as  it  does,  a  strong  tendency  to  central- 
ization, and  the  material  enhancement  of  the  Imperial  authority. 

1  When,  in  the  beginning  of  the  tenth  century,  the  German  Carolingian  line 
became  extinct,  the  great  nobles  of  the  kingdom  assumed  the  right  of  choosing 
the  successor  of  the  last  of  the  house,  and  Germany  thus  became  an  elective 
feudal  monarchy.  In  the  course  of  time  a  few  of  the  leading  nobles  usurped 
the  right  of  choosing  the  king,  and  these  princes  became  known  as  Electors. 
There  were,  at  the  end  of  the  Hohenstaufen  period,  seven  princes  who  enjoyed 
this  important  privilege,  four  of  whom  were  secular  princes  and  three  spiritual. 

2  The  House  of  Austria  is  often  so  called  from  the  Castle  of  Hapsburg  in 
Switzerland,  the  cradle  of  the  family. 


GERMAN    FOOT-SOLDIER. 
(15th  Century.) 


508  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

Beginning  of  German  Literature. 

Song  of  the  Nibelungen.  —  It  was  under  the  patronage  of  the 
Hohenstaufen  that  Germany  produced  the  first  pieces  of  a  national 
literature.  The  "  Song  of  the  Nibelungen  "  is  the  great  German 
mediaeval  epic.  It  was  reduced  to  writing  about  1200,  being  a 
recast,  by  some  Homeric  genius,  perhaps,  of  ancient  German  and 
Scandinavian  legends  and  lays  dating  from  the  sixth  and  seventh 
centuries.  The  hero  of  the  story  is  Siegfried,  the  Achilles  of 
Teutonic  legend  and  song. 

The  Minnesingers.  —  Under  the  same  emperors,  during  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries,  the  Minnesingers,  or  lyric  poets, 
flourished.  They  were  the  "  Troubadours  of  Germany."  For  the 
most  part,  refined  and  tender  and  chivalrous  and  pure,  the  songs 
of  these  poets  tended  to  soften  the  manners  and  lift  the  hearts  of 
the  German  people. 

5 .   Russia. 

Beginnings  of  Russia.  —  We  have  seen  how,  about  the  middle 
of  the  ninth  century,  the  Swedish  adventurer  Ruric  laid,  among 
the  Slavonian  tribes  dwelling  eastward  from  the  Baltic,  the  founda- 
tion of  what  was  destined  to  become  one  of  the  leading  powers 
of  Europe  (see  p.  411).  The  state  came  to  be  known  as  Russia, 
probably  from  the  word  Ruotsi  (corsairs  ?) ,  the  name  given  by  the 
Finns  to  the  foreigners. 

The  Tartar  Conquest.  —  In  the  thirteenth  century  an  over- 
whelming calamity  befell  Russia.  This  was  the  overrunning  and 
conquest  of  the  country  by  the  Tartar  hordes  (see  p.  461).  The 
barbarian  conquerors  inflicted  the  most  horrible  atrocities  upon 
the  unfortunate  land,  and  for  more  than  two  hundred  years  held  the 
Russian  princes  in  a  degrading  bondage,  forcing  them  to  pay 
homage  and  tribute.  This  misfortune  delayed  for  centuries  the 
nationalization  of  the  Slavonian  peoples. 

Russia  freed  from  the  Mongols.  —  It  was  not  until  the  reign  of 
Ivan  the  Great  (1462-1505)  that  Russia,  —  now  frequently  called 


NO  NATIONAL    GOVERNMENT.  509 

Muscovy  from  the  fact  that  it  had  been  reorganized  with  Moscow 
as  a  centre,  —  after  a  terrible  struggle,  succeeded  in  freeing  itself 
from  the  hateful  Tartar  domination,  and  began  to  assume  the 
character  of  a  well-consolidated  monarchy. 

Thus,  by  the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages,  Russia  had  become  a 
really  great  power ;  but  she  was  as  yet  too  much  hemmed  in  by 
hostile  states  to  be  able  to  make  her  influence  felt  in  the  affairs 
of  Europe.  Between  her  and  the  Caspian  and  Euxine  were  the 
Tartars ;  shutting  her  out  from  the  Baltic  were  the  Swedes  and 
other  peoples  ;  and  between  her  and  Germany  were  the  Lithuanians 
and  Poles. 

6.   Italy. 

No  National  Government.  —  In  marked  contrast  to  all  those 
countries  of  which  we  have  thus  far  spoken,  unless  we  except 
Germany,  Italy  came  to  the  close  of  the  Middle  Ages  without  a 
national  or  regular  government.  This  is  to  be  attributed  in  large 
part  to  that  unfortunate  rivalry  between  Pope  and  Emperor  which 
resulted  in  dividing  Italy  into  the  two  hostile  camps  of  Guelph 
and  Ghibelline.  And  yet  the  mediaeval  period  did  not  pass  with- 
out attempts  on  the  part  of  patriot  spirits  to  effect  some  sort  of 
political  union  among  the  different  cities  and  states  of  the  penin- 
sula. The  most  noteworthy  of  these  movements,  and  one  which 
gave  assurance  that  the  spark  of  patriotism  which  was  in  time  to 
flame  into  an  inextinguishable  passion  for  national  unity  was  kind- 
ling in  the  Italian  heart,  was  that  headed  by  the  hero  Rienzi,  in  the 
fourteenth  century. 

Rienzi,  Tribune  of  Rome  (1347).  —  During  the  greater  part  of 
the  fourteenth  century  the  seat  of  the  Papal  See  was  at  Avignon, 
beyond  the  Alps  (see  p.  457).  Throughout  this  period  of  the 
"  Babylonish  captivity,"  Rome,  deprived  of  her  natural  guardians, 
was  in  a  state  of  the  greatest  confusion.  The  nobles  terrorized 
the  country  about  the  capital,  and  kept  the  streets  of  the  city 
itself  in  constant  turmoil  with  their  bitter  feuds. 

In  the  midst  of  these  disorders  there  appeared  from  among  the 


510  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

lowest  ranks  of  the  people  a  deliverer  in  the  person  of  one  Nicola 
di  Rienzi.  Possessed  of  considerable  talent  and  great  eloquence, 
Rienzi  easily  incited  the  people  to  a  revolt  against  the  rule,  or 
rather  misrule,  of  the  nobles,  and  succeeded  in  having  himself, 
with  the  title  of  Tribune,  placed  at  the  head  of  a  new  government 
for  Rome. 

Encouraged  by  the  success  that  had  thus  far  attended  his 
schemes,  Rienzi  now  began  to  concert  measures  for  the  union  of 
all  the  principalities  and  commonwealths  of  Italy  in  a  great  repub- 
lic, with  Rome  as  its  capital.  He  sent  ambassadors  throughout 
Italy  to  plead,  at  the  courts  of  the  princes  and  in  the  council- 
chamber  of  the  municipalities,  the  cause  of  Italian  unity  and  free- 
dom. The  splendid  dream  of  Rienzi  was  shared  by  other  Italian 
patriots  besides  himself,  among  whom  was  the  poet  Petrarch,  who 
was  the  friend  and  encourager  of  the  "  plebeian  hero." 

But  the  moment  for  Italy's  unification  had  not  yet  come.  Not 
only  were  there  hindrances  to  the  national  movement  in  the  am- 
bitions and  passions  of  rival  parties  and  classes,  but  there  were  still 
greater  impediments  in  the  character  of  the  plebeian  patriot  him- 
self. Rienzi  proved  to  be  an  unworthy  leader.  His  sudden  ele- 
vation and  surprising  success  completely  turned  his  head,  and  he 
soon  began  to  exhibit  the  most  incredible  vanity  and  weakness. 
The  people  withdrew  from  him  their  support,  and  he  was  finally 
assassinated. 

Thus  vanished  the  dream  of  Rienzi  and  Petrarch,  of  the  hero 
and  the  poet.  Centuries  of  division,  of  shameful  subjection  to 
foreign  princes,  —  French,  Spanish,  and  Austrian,  —  of  wars  and 
suffering,  were  yet  before  the  Italian  people  ere  Rome  should  be- 
come the  centre  of  a  free,  orderly,  and  united  Italy. 

The  Renaissance.  —  Though  the  Middle  Ages  closed  in  Italy 
without  the  rise  there  of  a  national  government,  still  before  the  end 
of  the  period  much  had  been  done  to  awaken  those  common  ideas 
and  sentiments  upon  which  political  unity  can  alone  safely  repose. 
Literature  and  art  here  performed  the  part  that  war  did  in  other 
countries  in  arousing  a  national  spirit.     The  Renaissance  (see  p. 


THE  RENAISSANCE.  511 

474)  did  much  toward  creating  among  the  Italians  a  common 
pride  in  race  and  country ;  and  thus  this  great  literary  and  artistic 
enthusiasm  was  the  first  step  in  a  course  of  national  develop- 
ment which  was  to  lead  the  Italian  people  to  a  common  political 
life. 

Upon  the  literary  phase  of  the  Italian  Renaissance  we  have  said 
something  in  the  chapter  on  the  Revival  of  Learning  (see  p.  474)  ; 
we  shall  here  say  just  a  word  respecting  the  artistic  side  of  the 
movement. 

The  most  splendid  period  of  the  art  revival  covered  the  latter 
part  of  the  fifteenth  century  and  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth.  The 
characteristic  art  of  the  Renaissance  in  Italy  was  painting,  although 
the  aesthetic  genius  of  the  Italians  also  expressed  itself  both  in 
architecture  and  sculpture.1  The  mediaeval  artists  devoted  them- 
selves to  painting  instead  of  sculpture,  for  the  reason  that  it  best 
expresses  the  ideas  and  sentiments  of  Christianity.  The  art  that 
would  be  the  handmaid  of  the  Church  needed  to  be  able  to  repre- 
sent faith  and  hope,  ecstasy  and  suffering,  —  none  of  which  things 
can  well  be  expressed  by  sculpture,  which  is  essentially  the  art  of 
repose. 

Savonarola  (145  2-1498).  —  A  word  must  here  be  said  respect- 
ing the  Florentine  monk  and  reformer  Girolamo  Savonarola,  who 
stands  as  the  most  noteworthy  personage  in  Italy  during  the  clos- 
ing years  of  the  mediaeval  period. 

Savonarola  was  at  once  Roman  censor  and  Hebrew  prophet. 
Such  a  preacher  of  righteousness  the  world  had  not  seen  since  the 
days  of  Elijah.  His  powerful  preaching  alarmed  the  conscience 
of  the  Florentines.     At  his  suggestion  the  women  brought  their 

1  The  four  supreme  masters  of  the  Italian  Renaissance  were  Leonardo  da 
Vinci  (1452-1519),  Michael  Angelo  (1475-1564),  Raphael  (1483-1520),  and 
Titian  (1477-1576).  All  were  great  painters.  Perhaps  the  one  of  greatest, 
at  least  of  most  varied,  genius,  was  Michael  Angelo,  who  was  at  once  archi- 
tect, painter,  and  sculptor.  His  grandest  architectural  triumph  was  the  majes- 
tic dome  of  St.  Peter's,  —  which  work,  however,  he  did  not  live  to  see  com- 
pleted. 


512  GROWTH  OF  THE  NATIONS. 

finery  and  ornaments,  and  others  their  beautiful  works  of  art,  and 
piling  them  in  great  heaps  in  the  streets  of  Florence,  burned  them 
as  "vanities."  Savonarola  even  persuaded  the  people  of  Florence 
to  set  up  a  sort  of  theocratic  government,  of  which  Christ  was  the 
acknowledged  head.  But  at  length  the  activity  of  his  enemies 
brought  about  the  reformer's  downfall,  and  he  was  condemned  to 
death,  executed,  and  his  body  burned.  Savonarola  may  be  re- 
garded as  the  last  great  mediaeval  forerunner  of  the  reformers  of 
the  sixteenth  century. 

7.  The  Northern  Countries. 

The  Union  of  Calmar.  —  The  great  Scandinavian  Exodus  of  the 
ninth  and  tenth  centuries  drained  the  Northern  lands  of  some  of 
the  best  elements  of  their  population.  For  this  reason  these  coun- 
tries did  not  play  as  prominent  a  part  in  mediaeval  history  as  they 
would  otherwise  have  done.  The  constant  quarrels  between  their 
sovereigns  and  the  nobility  were  also  another  cause  of  internal 
weakness. 

In  the  year  1397,  by  what  is  known  as  the  Union  of  Calmar,  the 
three  kingdoms  of  Norway,  Denmark,  and  Sweden  were  united 
under  Margaret  of  Denmark,  "  the  Semiramis  of  the  North."  The 
treaty  provided  that  each  country  should  make  its  own  laws.  But 
the  treaty  was  violated,  and  though  the  friends  of  the  measure 
had  hoped  much  from  it,  it  brought  only  jealousies,  feuds,  and 
wars. 

The  Swedes  arose  again  and  again  in  revolt,  and  finally,  under 
the  lead  of  a  nobleman  named  Gustavus  Vasa,  made  good  their 
independence  (1523).  During  the  seventeenth  century,  under 
the  descendants  and  successors  of  the  Liberator,  Sweden  was  des- 
tined to  play  an  important  part  in  the  affairs  of  the  continent. 

Norway  became  virtually  a  province  of  Denmark,  and  the 
Norwegian  nobles  were  driven  into  exile  or  killed.  The  country 
remained  attached  to  the  Danish  Crown  until  the  present  century. 


SECTION  IL  — MODERN  HISTORY. 


INTRODUCTION. 


As  an  introduction  to  the  history  of  the  Modern  Age,  we  shall 
give  a  brief  account  of  the  voyages  and  geographical  discoveries  of 
Columbus,  Vasco  da  Gama,  and  Magellan,  and  of  the  beginning 
of  European  conquests  and  settlements  in  the  New  World,  inas- 
much as  these  great  events  lie  at  the  opening  of  the  era  and  form 
the  prelude  of  its  story. 

Discovery  of  the  New  World  by  Columbus  (1492).  —  Chris- 
topher Columbus  was  one  of  those 
Genoese  navigators  who,  when 
Genoa's  Asiatic  lines  of  trade  were 
broken  by  the  irruption  of  the 
Turks  (see  p.  467),  conceived  the 
idea  of  reaching  India  by  an 
ocean  route.  While  others  were 
endeavoring  to  reach  that  country 
by  sailing  around  the  southern 
point  of  Africa,  he  proposed  the 
bolder  plan  of  reaching  this  east- 
ern land  by  sailing  directly  west- 
ward. The  sphericity  of  the  earth 
was  a  doctrine  held  by  many  at 
that  day ;  but  the  theory  was  not 
in  harmony  with  the  religious  ideas 
of  the  time,  and  so  it  was  not  pru- 
dent for  one  to  publish  too  openly  one's  belief  in  the  notion. 

In  his  endeavors  to  secure  a  patron  for  his  enterprise,  Columbus 


COLUMBUS. 

(After  the  Yanez  Portrait  in  the  Madrid 

Library.) 


514 


INTRODUCTION. 


met  at  first  with  repeated  repulse  and  disappointment.  At  last, 
however,  he  gained  the  ear  of  Queen  Isabella  of  Spain ;  a  little 
fleet  was  fitted  out  for  the  explorer,  —  and  the  New  World  was 
found. 

Columbus  never  received  a  fitting  reward  for  the  great  service 
he  had  rendered  mankind.  Even  the  continent  to  which  he  had 
shown  the  way,  instead  of  being  called  after  him  as  a  perpetual 
memorial,  was  named  from  a  Florentine  navigator,  Amerigo  Ves- 
pucci, whose  chief  claim  to  this  distinction  was  his  having  published 
the  first  account  of  the  new  lands. 


THE   OCEAN    AND    ISLANDS    BETWEEN   WESTERN    EUROPE   AND    EASTERN    ASIA. 
From  the  Globe  of  Martin  Behaim,  1492.     (Cathaja=  China  ;  Cipango  =  Japan.) 


The  Voyage  of  Vasco  da  Gama  (1497-1498).  — The  favorable 
position  of  Portugal  upon  the  Atlantic  seaboard  naturally  led  her 
sovereigns  to  conceive  the  idea  of  competing  with  the  Italian  cities 
for  the  trade  of  the  East  Indies,  by  opening  up  an  ocean  route  to 
those  lands.  During  all  the  latter  part  of  the  fifteenth  century 
Portuguese  sailors  were  year  after  year  penetrating  a  little  farther 
into  the  mysterious  tropical  seas,  and  exploring  new  reaches  of  the 
western  coast  of  Africa. 

In  1487  the  most  southern  point  of  the  continent  was  reached, 


THE    VOYAGE  AROUND    THE   GLOBE.  515 

and  was  named  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  as  the  possibility  of 
reaching  India  by  sea  now  seemed  assured.  A  decade  later 
Vasco  da  Gama,  a  Portuguese  admiral,  doubled  the  Cape,  crossed 
the  Indian  Sea,  and  landed  on  the  coast  of  Malabar  (1498). 

The  discovery  of  a  water-path  to  India  effected,  as  we  have 
already  noticed  (see  p.  467),  most  important  changes  in  the  traffic 
of  the  world.  It  made  the  ports  of  Portugal  and  of  other  coun- 
tries on  the  Atlantic  seaboard  the  depots  of  the  Eastern  trade. 
"  The  front  of  Europe  was  suddenly  changed."  The  Italian  mer- 
chants were  ruined.  The  great  warehouses  of  Egypt  and  Syria 
were  left  empty.  The  traffic  of  the  Mediterranean  dwindled  to 
insignificant  proportions.  Portugal  established  trading-posts  and 
colonies  in  the  East,  and  built  up  there  a  great  empire,  —  like 
that  which  England  is  maintaining  in  the  same  region  at  the 
present  day. 

The  Voyage  around  the  Globe  (15 19-15 2 2). — Upon  the  re- 
turn of  Columbus  from  his  successful  expedition,  Pope  Alexander 
VI.,  with  a  view  to  adjusting  the  conflicting  claims  of  Spain  and 
Portugal,  divided  the  world  by  a  meridian  line  drawn  about  mid- 
way through  the  Atlantic,  and  gave  to  the  Spanish  sovereigns 
all  unclaimed  pagan  lands  that  their  subjects  might  find  west 
of  this  line,  and  to  the  Portuguese  kings  all  new  pagan  lands  dis- 
covered by  Portuguese  navigators  east  of  the  designated  merid- 
ian. 

The  determination  on  the  part  of  the  king  of  Spain  to  acquire 
title  under  the  papal  grant  to  the  valuable  Spice  Islands  of  the 
Pacific  by  reaching  them  through  sailing  westward,  led  him  to 
organize  an  expedition  of  discovery  in  the  western  seas.  The 
little  fleet  was  entrusted  to  the  command  of  Magellan,  a  Portu- 
guese admiral. 

Magellan  directed  his  fleet  in  a  southwesterly  course  across  the 
Atlantic,  hoping  to  find  towards  the  south  a  break  in  the  land  dis- 
covered by  Columbus.  Near  the  most  southern  point  of  Patago- 
nia he  found  the  narrow  strait  that  now  bears  his  name,  through 
which  he  pushed  his  vessel  into  the  sea  beyond.     From  the  calm, 


516  INTR  OD  UC  TION. 

unruffled  face  of  the  new  ocean,  so  different  from  the  stormy 
Atlantic,  he  gave  to  it  the  name  Pacific. 

After  a  most  adventurous  voyage  upon  the  hitherto  untraversed 
waters  of  the  new  sea,  the  expedition  reached  the  Spice  Islands, 
and  eventually  arrived  home,  after  an  absence  of  over  three  years. 
For  the  first  time  men  had  gone  around  the  globe  that  they  had 
so  long  lived  upon.  The  achievement  of  course  settled  forever 
the  question  as  to  the  shape  of  the  earth.  It  pushed  aside  all  the 
old  narrow  geographical  ideas,  and  broadened  immensely  the 
physical  horizon  of  the  world. 

Conquest  of  Mexico  (15 19-15  21).  —  Soon  after  the  discovery 
of  the  New  World,  Spanish  settlements  were  established  upon  the 
islands  in  front  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  Among  the  colonists  here 
were  constantly  spread  reports  of  a  great  and  rich  Indian  mon- 
archy upon  the  mainland  to  the  west.  These  stories  inflamed  the 
imagination  of  the  more  adventurous  among  the  settlers,  and  an 
expedition  was  organized  and  placed  under  the  command  of 
Hernando  Cortez,  for  the  conquest  and  "conversion"  of  the 
heathen  nation.  The  expedition  was  successful,  and  soon  the 
Spaniards  were  masters  of  the  greater  part  of  Mexico. 

The  state  that  the  conquerors  destroyed  was  hardly  an 
"empire,"  as  termed  by  the  Spanish  writers,  but  rather  a  con- 
federacy, somewhat  like  the  Iroquois  confederacy  in  the  North. 
It  embraced  three  tribes,  of  which  the  Aztecs  were  leaders.  At 
the  head  of  the  league  was  a  war-chief,  who  bore  the  name  of 
Montezuma. 

The  Mexican  Indians  had  taken  some  steps  in  civilization. 
They  employed  a  system  of  picture-writing,  and  had  cities  and 
temples.  But  they  were  cannibals,  and  offered  human  sacrifices 
to  their  gods.  They  had  no  knowledge  of  the  horse  or  of  the  ox, 
and  were  of  course  ignorant  of  the  use  of  fire-arms. 

The  Conquest  of  Peru  (1532-1536).  —  Shortly  after  the  con- 
quest of  the  Indians  of  Mexico,  the  subjugation  of  the  Indians  of 
Peru  was  also  effected.  The  civilization  of  the  Peruvians  was 
superior  to  that  of  the  Mexicans.     Not  only  were  the  great  cities 


CONQUEST  OF  PERU.  517 

of  the  Peruvian  empire  filled  with  splendid  temples  and  palaces, 
but  throughout  the  country  were  magnificent  works  of  public 
utility,  such  as  roads,  bridges,  and  aqueducts.  The  government 
of  the  Incas,  the  royal,  or  ruling  race,  was  a  mild,  parental  au- 
tocracy. 

Glowing  reports  of  the  enormous  wealth  of  the  Incas,  —  the 
commonest  articles  in  whose  palaces,  it  was  asserted,  were  of  solid 
gold,  reached  the  Spaniards  by  way  of  the  Isthmus  of  Darien,  and  it 
was  not  long  before  an  expedition  was  organized  for  the  conquest 
of  the  country.  The  leader  of  the  band  was  Francisco  Pizarro, 
an  iron-hearted,  perfidious,  and  illiterate  adventurer. 

Through  treachery,  Pizarro  made  a  prisoner  of  the  Inca  Ata- 
hualpa.  The  captive  offered,  as  a  ransom  for  his  release,  to  fill 
the  room  in  which  he  was  confined  "  as  high  as  he  could  reach  " 
with  vessels  of  gold.  Pizarro  accepted  the  offer,  and  the  palaces 
and  temples  throughout  the  empire  were  stripped  of  their  golden 
vessels,  and  the  apartment  was  filled  with  the  precious  relics.  The 
value  of  the  treasure  is  estimated  at  over  $17,000,000.  When  this 
vast  wealth  was  once  under  the  control  of  the  Spaniards,  they 
seized  it  all,  and  then  treacherously  put  the  Inca  to  death  (1533). 
With  the  death  of  Atahualpa  the  power  of  the  Inca  dynasty 
passed  away  forever. 

Spanish  Colonization  in  the  New  World.  —  Not  until  more 
than  one  hundred  years  after  the  discovery  of  the  Western  Hemi- 
sphere by  Columbus,  was  there  established  a  single  permanent 
English  settlement  within  the  limits  of  what  is  now  the  United 
States,  the  portion  of  the  New  World  destined  to  be  taken  pos- 
session of  by  the  peoples  of  Northern  Europe,  and  to  become  the 
home  of  civil  and  religious  freedom. 

But  into  those  parts  of  the  new  lands  opened  up  by  Spanish 
exploration  and  conquest  there  began  to  pour  at  once  a  tremen- 
dous stream  of  Spanish  adventurers  and  colonists,  in  search  of 
fortune  and  fame.  It  was  a  sort  of  Spanish  migration.  The 
movement  might  be  compared  to  the  rush  of  population  from  the 
Eastern  States  to  California,  after  the  announcement  of  the  dis- 


518  INTRODUCTION. 

covery  there  of  gold,  in  1848-9.  Upon  the  West  India  Islands, 
in  Mexico,  in  Central  America,  all  along  the  Pacific  slope  of  the 
Andes,  and  everywhere  upon  the  lofty  and  pleasant  table -lands 
that  had  formed  the  heart  of  the  empire  of  the  Incas,  there  sprang 
up  rapidly  great  cities  as  the  centres  of  mining  and  agricultural 
industries,  of  commerce  and  of  trade.  Thus  did  a  Greater  Spain 
grow  up  in  the  New  World.  It  was,  in  a  large  measure,  the  treas- 
ures derived  from  these  new  possessions  that  enabled  the  sover- 
eigns of  Spain  to  play  the  imposing  part  they  did  in  the  affairs  of 
Europe  during  the  century  following  the  discovery  of  America.1 

1  After  having  robbed  the  Indians  of  their  wealth  in  gold  and  silver,  the 
slow  accumulations  of  centuries,  the  Spaniards  further  enriched  themselves 
by  the  enforced  labor  of  the  unfortunate  natives.  Unused  to  such  toil  as  was 
exacted  of  them  under  the  lash  of  worse  than  Egyptian  task-masters,  the 
Indians  wasted  away  by  millions  in  the  mines  of  Mexico  and  Peru,  and  upon 
the  sugar  plantations  of  the  West  Indies.  More  than  half  of  the  native  popu- 
lation of  Peru  is  thought  to  have  been  consumed  in  the  Peruvian  mines.  To 
save  the  Indians,  negroes  were  introduced  as  a  substitute  for  native  laborers. 
This  was  the  beginning  of  the  African  slave-trade  in  the  New  World.  The 
traffic  was  especially  encouraged  by  a  benevolent  priest  named  Las  Casas 
(1474-1566),  known  as  the  "Apostle  of  the  Indians."  Thus  the  gigantic 
evil  of  African  slavery  in  the  Western  Hemisphere,  like  the  gladiatorial 
shows  of  the  Romans,  was  brought  into  existence,  or,  rather,  in  its  beginning 
was  fostered,  by  a  philanthropic  desire  and  effort  to  mitigate  human  suffering. 


FIRST   PERIOD. —  THE    ERA    OF    THE    PROTESTANT 
REFORMATION. 

(FROM   THE    DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA  TO  THE    PEACE   OF    WESTPHALIA,    IN  1648.) 


CHAPTER    XLVIII. 

THE   BEGINNING   OF  THE   REFORMATION  UNDER   LUTHER. 

General  Statement. — We  have  already  indicated  (see  pp. 
366-7),  the  two  periods  of  modern  history;  namely,  the  Era  of 
the  Protestant  Reformation  and  the  Era  of  the  Political  Revolution. 
We  need  here  simply  to  remind  the  reader  that  the  first  period, 
extending  from  the  opening  of  the  sixteenth  century  to  the  Peace 
of  Westphalia  in  .1648,  is  characterized  by  the  revolt  of  the  nations 
of  Northern  Europe  against  the  spiritual  jurisdiction  of  Rome,  and 
the  great  combat  between  Protestantism  and  Catholicism  ;  and 
that  the  second  period,  running  from  the  Peace  of  Westphalia  to 
our  own  day,  is  distinguished  by  the  contest  between  the  people 
and  their  rulers,  or,  in  other  words,  by  the  conflict  between  liberal 
and  despotic  principles  of  government. 

We  shall  now  proceed  to  speak  of  the  causes  and  general  feat- 
ures of  the  Reformation,  and  in  succeeding  chapters  shall  follow 
its  fortunes  in  the  various  countries  of  Europe. 

Extent  of  Rome's  Spiritual  Authority  at  the  Opening  of  the 
Sixteenth  Century.  —  In  a  preceding  chapter  on  the  Papacy  it 
was  shown  how  perfect  at  one  time  was  the  obedience  of  the  West, 
not  only  to  the  spiritual,  but  to  the  temporal,  authority  of  the 
Pope.  It  was  also  shown  how  the  papal  claim  of  the  right  to 
dictate  in  temporal  or  governmental  affairs  was  practically  rejected 


520  THE  REFORMATION. 

by  the  princes  and  sovereigns  of  Europe  as  early  as  the  fourteenth 
century  (see  p.  458).  But  previous  to  the  opening  of  the  sixteenth 
century  there  had  been  comparatively  few  —  though  there  had 
been  some,  like  the  Albigenses  in  the  South  of  France,  the  Wick- 
liffites  in  England,  and  the  Hussites  in  Bohemia  —  who  denied  the 
supreme  and  infallible  authority  of  the  bishops  of  Rome  in  all 
matters  touching  religion.  Speaking  in  a  very  general  manner, 
it  would  be  correct  to  say  that  at  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century 
all  the  nations  of  Western  Europe  professed  the  faith  of  the  Latin, 
or  Roman  Catholic  Church,  and  yielded  spiritual  obedience  to 
the  Papal  See. 

Causes  of  the  Reformation.  —  We  must  now  seek  the  causes 
which  led  one-half  of  the  nations  of  Europe  to  secede,  as  it  were, 
from  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  The  causes  were  many. 
Among  others  may  be  mentioned  the  great  mental  awakening 
which  marked  the  close  of  the  mediaeval  and  the  opening  of  the 
modern  age ;  for  the  intellectual  revival,  though  often  spoken  of, 
in  so  far  as  it  concerned  the  Northern  nations,  as  an  effect  of  the 
religious  revival,  was  in  reality  at  once  cause  and  effect.  It 
hastened  the  Reformation,  and  was  itself  hastened  by  it.  And  in 
connection  with  the  Revival  of  Learning  must  be  mentioned  the 
invention  of  printing  as  a  powerful  agency  in  the  promotion  of  the 
religious  movement.  The  press  scattered  broadcast  over  Europe, 
not  only  the  Bible,  but  the  writings  of  the  men  who  had  begun  to 
doubt  the  scriptural  authority  for  many  of  the  doctrines  and  cere- 
monies of  the  Church,  —  such  as  the  adoration  of  the  Virgin,  the 
invoking  of  saints,  the  use  of  images,  confession  to  a  priest,  and  the 
nature  of  the  elements  in  the  Eucharist.  These  writings  of  course 
stirred  up  debate,  and  led  to  questioning  and  criticism. 

A  second  cause  was  the  existence  of  most  serious  scandals  and 
abuses  in  the  Church.  During  the  fifteenth  century,  the  morality 
of  the  Church  was  probably  lower  than  at  any  other  period  in  its 
history.  The  absolute  necessity  of  its  thorough  reform  in  both 
"  head  and  members  "  was  recognized  by  all  earnest  and  spiritual- 
minded   men.     The  only  difference  of  opinion  among  such  was 


CAUSES   OF  THE  REFORMATION.  521 

as  to  the  manner  in  which  the  work  of  purification  should  be 
effected. 

A  third  cause  may  be  found  in  the  claims  of  the  Popes  to  the 
right  to  interfere  in  the  internal,  governmental  affairs  of  a  nation ; 
for,  although  these  claims  had  been  rejected  by  the  sovereigns  of 
Europe,  they  were  nevertheless  still  maintained  by  the  Roman 
bishops,  and  this  caused  the  temporal  princes  to  regard  with  great 
jealousy  the  papal  power. 

But  foremost  among  the  proximate  causes,  and  the  actual 
occasion  of  the  revolution,  was  the  controversy  which  arose  about 
the  doctrine  of  indulgences.  These  were  remissions  of  punish- 
ment granted  to  persons  who  preferred  to  pay  a  sum  of  money 
rather  than  perform  the  penances  imposed  upon  them  by  the 
Church.  It  is,  and  always  has  been,  the  theory  of  the  Catholic 
Church,  that  the  indulgence  remits  merely  temporal  penalties,  — 
that  is,  penalties  imposed  by  ecclesiastical  authority,  and  the  pains 
of  Purgatory,  —  and  that  it  can  take  effect  only  upon  certain  con- 
ditions, among  which  is  that  of  sincere  repentance.  Indulgences 
were  frequently  granted  by  various  pontiffs,  as  a  means  of  raising 
funds  for  pious  enterprises.  A  considerable  portion  of  the  money 
for  building  the  Cathedral  of  St.  Peter  at  Rome  was  raised  in  this 
manner. 

Tetzel  and  the  Preaching  of  Indulgences.  —  Leo  X.,  upon  his 
election  to  the  papal  dignity,  in  15 13,  found  the  coffers  of  the 
Church  almost  empty ;  and,  being  in  pressing  need  of  money  to 
carry  on  his  various  undertakings,  among  which  was  work  upon 
St.  Peter's,  he  had  recourse  to  the  then  common  expedient  of  a 
grant  of  indulgences.  He  delegated  the  power  of  dispensing  these 
in  Germany  to  the  archbishop  of  Magdeburg,  who  employed  a 
Dominican  friar  by  the  name  of  Tetzel  as  his  deputy  in  Saxony. 

The  archbishop  was  unfortunate  in  the  selection  of  his  agent. 
Tetzel  carried  out  his  commission  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  rise  to 
great  scandal.  The  language  that  he,  or  at  least  his  subordinates, 
used,  in  exhorting  the  people  to  comply  with  the  conditions  of 
gaining  the  indulgences,  one  of  which  was  a  donation  of  money, 


522 


THE  REFORMATION. 


was  unseemly  and  exaggerated.  The  result  was  that  erroneous 
views  as  to  the  effect  of  indulgences  began  to  spread  among  the 
simple  and  credulous,  some  being  so  far  misled  as  to  think  that  if 
they  only  contributed  this  money  to  the  building  of  St.  Peter's  at 
Rome  they  would  be  exempt  from  all  penalty  for  sins,  paying  little 
heed  to  the  other  conditions,  such  as  sorrow  for  sin,  and  purpose 
of  amendment.  Hence,  many  were  led  to  declaim  against  the 
procedure  of  the  zealous  friar.  These  protests  were  the  near 
mutterings  of  a  storm  that  had  long  been  gathering,  and  that  was 
soon  to  shake  all  Europe  from  the  Baltic  to  the  Mediterranean. 

Martin  Luther.  —  Foremost  among  those  who   opposed   and 
denounced  Tetzel  was  Martin  Luther  (1483-1546),  an  Augustine 

monk,  and  a  teacher  of  the- 
ology in  the  university  of 
Wittenberg.  Hewasof 
humble  parentage,  his  fa- 
ther being  a  poor  miner. 
The  boy  possessed  a  good 
voice,  and  frequently,  while 
a  student,  earned  his  bread 
by  singing  from  door  to 
door.  The  natural  bent  of 
his  mind,  and,  if  we  may 
believe  a  somewhat  doubt- 
ful legend,  the  death  of  a 
friend  struck  down  at  his 
side  by  lightning,  led  him 
to  resolve  to  enter  a  mon- 
astery and  devote  himself 
to  the  service  of  the  Church. 
Luther  had  already  earned 


MARTIN    LUTHER. 


Before  Tetzel  appeared  in  Germany 
a  wide  reputation  for  learning  and  piety. 

The  Ninety-five  Theses.  — The  form  which  Church  penances 
had  taken  in  the  hands  of  Tetzel  and  his  associates,  together  with 
other  circumstances,  awakened  in  Luther's  mind  doubts  and  ques- 


THE  PAPAL  BULL.  523 

tionings  as  to  many  of  the  doctrines  of  the  Church.  Especially 
was  there  gradually  maturing  within  him  a  conviction  that  the 
entire  system  of  ecclesiastical  penances  and  indulgences  was  un- 
scriptural  and  wrong.  His  last  lingering  doubt  respecting  this 
matter  appears  to  have  been  removed  while,  during  an  official 
visit  to  Rome  in  1510,  he  was  penitentially  ascending  on  his  knees 
the  sacred  stairs  {scala  santd)  of  the  Lateran,  when  he  seemed 
to  hear  an  inner  voice  declaring,  "  The  just  shall  live  by  faith." 

At  length  Luther  drew  up  ninety-five  theses,  or  articles,  wherein 
he  fearlessly  stated  his  views  respecting  indulgences.  These 
theses,  written  in  Latin,  he  nailed  to  the  door  of  the  church  at 
Wittenberg,  and  invited  all  scholars  to  examine  and  criticise  them, 
and  to  point  out  if  in  any  respect  they  were  opposed  to  the  teach- 
ings of  the  Word  of  God,  or  of  the  early  Fathers  of  the  Church 
(15 1 7).  By  means  of  the  press  the  theses  were  scattered  with 
incredible  rapidity  throughout  every  country  in  Europe. 

Burning  of  the  Papal  Bull  (1520).  —  All  the  continent  was  now 
plunged  into  a  perfect  tumult  of  controversy.  Luther,  growing 
bolder,  was  soon  attacking  the  entire  system  and  body  of  teachings 
of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  At  first  the  Pope,  Leo  X.,  was  in- 
clined to  regard  the  whole  matter  as  u  a  mere  squabble  of  monks," 
but  at  length  he  felt  constrained  to  issue  a  bull  against  the  auda- 
cious reformer  (15  20) .  His  writings  were  condemned  as  heretical, 
and  all  persons  were  forbidden  to  read  them  ;  and  he  himself,  if  he 
did  not  recant  his  errors  within  sixty  days,  was  to  be  seized  and 
delivered  to  the  Church  for  punishment.  Luther  in  reply  publicly 
burned  the  papal  bull  at  one  of  the  gates  of  Wittenberg. 

The  Diet  of  Worms  (1521).  —  Leo  now  invoked  the  aid  of 
the  recently  elected  Emperor  Charles  the  Fifth  in  extirpating  the 
spreading  heresy.  The  emperor  complied  by  summoning  Luther 
before  the  Diet  of  Worms,  an  assembly  of  the  princes,  nobles, 
and  clergy  of  Germany,  convened  at  Worms  to  deliberate  upon 
the  affairs  of  Germany,  and  especially  upon  matters  touching 
the  great  religious  controversy. 

Called  upon  in  the  Imperial  assembly  to  recant  his  errors,  Luther 


524  THE  REFORMATION. 

steadily  refused  to  do  so,  unless  his  teachings  could  be  shown  to 
be  inconsistent  with  the  Bible.  Although  some  wished  to  deliver 
the  reformer  to  the  flames,  the  safe-conduct  of  the  emperor  under 
which  he  had  come  to  the  Diet  protected  him.  So  Luther  was 
allowed  to  depart  in  safety,  but  was  followed  by^  a  decree  of  the 
assembly  which  pronounced  him  a  heretic  and  an  outlaw. 

But  Luther  had  powerful  friends  among  the  princes  of  Germany, 
one  of  whom  was  his  own  prince,  Frederick  the  Wise,  Elector  of 
Saxony.  Solicitous  for  the  safety  of  the  reformer,  the  prince 
caused  him  to  be  seized  on  his  way  from  the  Diet  by  a  company 
of  masked  horsemen,  who  carried  him  to  the  castle  of  the  Wart- 
burg,  where  he  was  kept  about  a  year,  his  retreat  being  known 
only  to  a  few  friends.  During  this  period  of  forced  retirement 
from  the  world,  Luther  was  hard  at  work  upon  his  celebrated 
translation  of  the  Bible. 

The  Peasants'  War  (15 24-15 25).  —  Before  quite  a  year  had 
passed,  Luther  was  called  from  the  Wartburg  by  the  troubles 
caused  by  a  new  sect  that  had  appeared,  known  as  the  Anabap- 
tists, whose  excesses  were  casting  great  discredit  upon  the  whole 
reform  movement.  Luther's  sudden  appearance  at  Wittenberg 
gave  a  temporary  check  to  the  agitation. 

But  in  the  course  of  two  or  three  years  the  trouble  broke  out 
afresh,  and  in  a  more  complex  and  aggravated  form.  The  peas- 
ants of  Suabia  and  Franconia,  stung  to  madness  by  the  oppres- 
sions of  their  feudal  lords,  stirred  by  the  religious  excitement  that 
filled  the  air,  and  influenced  by  the  incendiary  preaching  of  their 
prophets  Carlstadt  and  Miinzer,  rose  in  revolt  against  the  nobles 
and  priests.  Castles  and  monasteries  were  sacked  and  burned, 
and  horrible  outrages  were  committed.  The  rebellion  was  at 
length  crushed,  but  not  until  one  hundred  thousand  lives  had  been 
sacrificed,  a  large  part  of  South  Germany  ravaged,  and  great 
reproach  cast  upon  the  reformers,  whose  teachings  were  held  by 
their  enemies  to  be  the  whole  cause  of  the  ferment. 

The  Reformers  are  called  Protestants.  —  Notwithstanding  all 
the  efforts  that  were  made  to  suppress  the  doctrines  of  Luther, 


PROGRESS   OF  THE  REFORMATION  CHECKED.        525 

they  gained  ground  rapidly,  and  in  the  year  1529  another  assembly, 
known  as  the  Second  Diet  of  Spires,  was  called  to  consider  the 
matter.  This  body  issued  an  edict  forbidding  all  persons  doing 
anything  to  promote  the  spread  of  the  new  doctrines,  until  a  gen- 
eral council  of  the  Church  should  have  investigated  them  and 
pronounced  authoritatively  upon  them.  Seven  of  the  German 
princes,  and  a  large  number  of  the  cities  of  the  empire,  issued  a 
formal  protest  against  the  action  of  the  Diet.  Because  of  this 
protest,  the  reformers  from  this  time  began  to  be  known  as 
Protestants. 

Causes  that  checked  the  Progress  of  the  Reformation.  —  Even 
before  the  death  of  Luther,1  which  occurred  in  the  year  1546,  the 
Reformation  had  gained  a  strong  foothold  in  most  of  the  countries 
of  Western  Christendom,  save  in  Spain  and  Italy,  and  even  in 
these  parts  the  new  doctrines  had  made  some  progress.  It  seemed 
as  if  the  revolt  from  Rome  was  destined  to  become  universal,  and 
the  old  ecclesiastical  empire  to  be  completely  broken  up. 

But  several  causes  now  conspired  to  check  the  hitherto  trium- 
phant advance  of  Protestantism,  and  to  confine  the  movement 
to  the  Northern  nations.  Chief  among  these  were  the  divisions 
among  the  Protestants,  the  Catholic  counter-reform,  the  increased 
activity  of  the  Inquisition,  and  the  rise  of  the  Order  of  the  Jesuits. 

Divisions  among  the  Protestants.  —  Early  in  their  contest  with 
Rome,  the  Protestants  became  divided  into  numerous  hostile 
sects.  In  Switzerland  arose  the  Zwinglians  (followers  of  Ulrich 
Xwingle,  1484- 1531),  who  differed  from  the  Lutherans  in  their 
views  regarding  the  Eucharist,  and  on  some  other  points  of  doc- 
trine. The  Calvinists  were  followers  of  John  Calvin  (1509- 
1564),  a  Frenchman  by  birth,  who,  forced  to  flee  from  France 

1  After  the  death  of  Luther,  the  leadership  of  the  Reformation  in  Germany 
fell  to  Philip  Melanchthon  (1497-1560),  one  of  Luther's  friends  and  fellow- 
workers.  Melanchthon's  disposition  was  exactly  the  opposite  of  Luther's. 
He  often  reproved  Luther  for  his  indiscretion  and  vehemence,  and  was  con- 
stantly laboring  to  effect,  through  mutual  concessions,  a  reconciliation  between 
the  Roman  Catholics  and  the  Protestants. 


526 


THE  REFORMATION. 


on  account  of  persecution,  found  a  refuge  at  Geneva,  of  which 
city  he  became  a  sort  of  Protestant  pope.1 
The  great  Protestant  communions  quickly  broke  up  into  a  large 

number  of  denominations,  or 
churches,  each  holding  to  some 
minor  point  of  doctrine,  or 
adhering  to  some  form  of  wor- 
ship disregarded  by  the  others, 
yet  all  agreeing  in  the  central 
doctrine  of  the  Reformation, 
"  Justification  by  faith." 

Now  the  contentions  between 
these  different  sects  were  sharp 
and  bitter.  The  liberal-minded 
reformer  had  occasion  to  la- 
ment the  same  state  of  things 
as  that  which  troubled  the  apos- 
tle Paul  in  the  early  days  of 
Christianity.  One  said,  I  am 
of  Luther ;  another  said,  I  am  of  Calvin ;  and  another  said,  I 
am  of  Zwingle.  Even  Luther  himself  denounced  Zwingle  as  a 
heretic ;  and  the  Calvinists  would  have  no  dealings  with  the 
Lutherans. 

The  influence  of  these  sectarian,  divisions  upon  the  progress  of 
the  Reformation  was  most  disastrous.  They  afforded  the  Catho- 
lics a  strong  and  effective  argument  against  the  entire  movement 
as  tending  to  uncertainty  and  discord. 

The  Catholic  Counter-Reform.  —  While  the  Protestants  were 
thus  breaking  up  into  numerous  rival  sects,  the  Catholics  were 
removing  the  causes  of  dissension  within   the  old  Church  by  a 

1  Calvin  was,  next  after  Luther,  the  greatest  of  the  reformers.  The  doc- 
trines of  Calvin  came  to  prevail  very  widely,  and  have  exerted  a  most  remark- 
able influence  upon  the  general  course  of  history.  "  The  Huguenots  of  France, 
the  Covenanters  of  Scotland,  the  Puritans  of  England,  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  of 
New  England,  were  all  the  offspring  of  Calvinism." 


JOHN    CALVIN. 


THE  INQUISITION.  527 

thorough  reform  in  its  head  and  members,  and  by  a  clear  and 
authoritative  restatement  of  the  doctrines  of  the  Catholic  faith. 
This  was  accomplished  very  largely  by  the  labors  of  the  celebrated 
Council  of  Trent  (1545-1563).  The  correction  of  the  abuses 
that  had  so  much  to  do  in  causing  the  great  schism,  smoothed 
the  way  for  the  return  to  the  ancient  Church  of  thousands  who  had 
become  alarmed  at  the  dangers  into  which  society  seemed  to  drift 
when  once  it  cast  loose  from  anchorage  in  the  safe  harbor  of  tra- 
dition and  authority. 

The  Inquisition.  —  The  Roman  Catholic  Church  having  puri- 
fied itself  and  defined  clearly  its  articles  of  faith,  demanded  of  all 
a  more  implicit  obedience  than  hitherto.  The  Inquisition,  or 
Holy  Office  (see  p.  500),  now  assumed  new  vigor  and  activity,  and 
heresy  was  sternly  dealt  with.  The  tribunal  was  assisted  in  the 
execution  of  its  sentences  by  the  secular  authorities  in  all  the 
Romance  countries,  but  outside  of  these  it  was  not  generally  recog- 
nized by  the  temporal  princes,  though  it  did  succeed  in  establish- 
ing itself  for  a  time  in  the  Netherlands  and  in  some  parts  of 
Germany.  Death,  usually  by  burning,  and  loss  of  property  were  the 
penalty  of  obstinate  heresy.  Without  doubt  the  Holy  Office  did 
much  to  check  the  advance  of  the  Reformation  in  Southern 
Europe,  aiding  especially  in  holding  Italy  and  Spain  compactly 
obedient  to  the  ancient  Church. 

At  this  point,  in  connection  with  the  persecutions  of  the  Inqui- 
sition, we  should  not  fail  to  recall  that  in  the  sixteenth  century  a 
refusal  to  conform  to  the  established  worship  was  regarded  by  all, 
by  Protestants  as  well  as  by  Catholics,  as  a  species  of  treason 
against  society,  and  was  dealt  with  accordingly.  Thus  we  find 
Calvin  at  Geneva  consenting  to  the  burning  of  Servetus  (1553), 
because  he  published  views  that  the  Calvinists  thought  heretical ; 
and  in  England  we  see  the  Anglican  Protestants  waging  the  most 
cruel,  bitter,  and  persistent  persecutions,  not  only  against  the 
Catholics,  but  also  against  all  Protestants  that  refused  to  con- 
form to  the  Established  Church. 

The  Jesuits.  —  The  Order  of  Jesuits,  or  Society  of  Jesus,  was 


528  THE  REFORMATION. 

another  most  powerful  agent  concerned  in  the  re- establishment  of 
the  threatened  authority  of  the  Papal  See.  The  founder  of  the 
institution  was  St.  Ignatius  Loyola  (1491-1556),  a  native  of  Spain. 

Loyola's  object  was  to  form  a  so- 
ciety, the  devotion  and  energy  of 
whose  numbers  should  counteract 
the  zeal  and  activity  of  the  re- 
formers. 

As  the  well-disciplined,  watch- 
ful, and  uncompromising  foes  of 
the  Protestant  reformers,  now  di- 
vided into  many  and  often  hostile 
sects,  the  Jesuits  did  very  much 
to  bring  about  a  reaction,  to 
loyola.    (From  a  medal.)  retrieve  the  failing  fortunes  of  the 

papal  power  in  Europe,  and  to  extend  the  authority  and  doctrines 
of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  in  all  other  parts  of  the  world. 
Most  distinguished  of  the  missionaries  of  the  order  to  pagan  lands 
was  Francis  Xavier  (1506-15 6 2),  known  as  the  Apostle  of  the 
Indies.  His  labors  in  India,  Japan,  and  other  lands  of  the  East 
were  attended  with  astonishing  results. 

Outcome  of  the  Revolt.  —  As  in  following  chapters  we  are  to 
trace  the  fortunes  of  the  Reformation  in  the  leading  European 
countries,  we  shall  here  say  only  a  word  as  to  the  issue  of  the 
great  contest. 

The  outcome  of  the  revolt,  very  broadly  stated,  was  the  separa- 
tion from  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  of  the  Northern,  or  Teu- 
tonic nations  j  that  is  to  say,  of  Northern  Germany,  of  portions  of 
Switzerland  and  of  the  Netherlands,  of  Denmark,  Norway,  Sweden, 
England,  and  Scotland.  The  Romance  nations,  namely,  Italy, 
France  and  Spain,  together  with  Celtic  Ireland,  adhered  to  the 
old  Church. 

What  this  separation  from  Rome  meant  in  the  political  realm  is 
well  stated  by  Seebohm  :  "  It  was  the  claiming  by  the  civil  power 
in  each  nation  of  those  rights  which  the  Pope  had  hitherto  claimed 


OUTCOME    OF  THE  REVOLT.  529 

within  it  as  head  of  the  great  ecclesiastical  empire.  The  clergy 
and  monks  had  hitherto  been  regarded  more  or  less  as  foreigners  — 
that  is,  as  subjects  of  the  Pope's  ecclesiastical  empire.  Where 
there  was  a  revolt  from  Rome  the  allegiance  of  these  persons  to 
the  Pope  was  annulled,  and  the  civil  power  claimed  as  full  a  sover- 
eignty over  them  as  it  had  over  its  lay  subjects.  Matters  relating 
to  marriage  and  wills  still  for  the  most  part  remained  under  eccle- 
siastical jurisdiction,  but  then,  as  the  ecclesiastical  courts  them- 
selves became  national  courts  and  ceased  to  be  Roman  or  papal, 
all  these  matters  came  under  the  control  of  the  civil  power." 

In  a  spiritual  or  religious  point  of  view,  this  severance  by  the 
Northern  nations  of  the  bonds  that  formerly  united  them  to  the 
ecclesiastical  empire  of  Rome,  meant  a  transfer  of  their  allegiance 
from  the  Church  to  the  Bible.  The  decrees  of  Popes  and  the 
decisions  of  Councils  were  no  longer  to  be  regarded  as  having 
divine  and  binding  force ;  the  Scriptures  alone  were  to  be  held  as 
possessing  divine  and  infallible  authority,  and,  theoretically,  this 
rule  and  standard  of  faith  and  practice  each  one  was  to  interpret 
for  himself. 

Thus  one-half  of  Western  Christendom  was  lost  to  the  Roman 
Church.  Yet  notwithstanding  this  loss,  notwithstanding  the  earlier 
loss  of  the  Eastern  part  of  Christendom  (see  p.  417),  and  not- 
withstanding the  fact  that  its  temporal  power  has  been  entirely 
taken  from  it,  the  Papacy  still  remains,  as  Macaulay  says,  "  not  a 
mere  antique,  but  full  of  life  and  youthful  vigor."  The  Pope  is 
to-day  the  supreme  and  infallible  Plead  of  a  Church  that,  in  the 
words  of  the  brilliant  writer  just  quoted,  "  was  great  and  respected 
before  Saxon  had  set  foot  on  Britain,  before  the  Frank  had  passed 
the  Rhine,  when  Grecian  eloquence  still  flourished  in  Antioch, 
when  idols  were  still  worshipped  in  the  temple  of  Mecca.  And 
she  may  still  exist  in  undiminished  vigor  when  some  traveller  from 
New  Zealand  shall,  in  the  midst  of  a  vast  solitude,  take  his  stand 
on  a  broken  arch  of  London  Bridge  to  sketch  the  ruins  of  St. 
Paul's." 


530  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  SPAIN 


CHAPTER    XLIX. 

THE  ASCENDENCY   OF   SPAIN. 
i.  Reign  of  the  Emperor  Charles  V.  (151 9- 1556). 

Charles'  Dominions.  —  Charles  I.  of  Spain,  better  known  to 
fame  as  Emperor  Charles  V.,  was  the  son  of  Philip  the  Handsome, 
Archduke  of  Austria,  and  Joanna,  daughter  of  Ferdinand  and  Isa- 
bella of  Spain.  He  was  "  the  converging  point  and  heir  of  four 
great  royal  lines,  which  had  become  united  by  a  series  of  happy 
matrimonial  alliances."  These  were  the  houses  of  Austria,  Bur- 
gundy, Castile,  and  Aragon.  Before  Charles  had  completed  his 
nineteenth  year,  there  were  heaped  upon  his  head,  through  the 
removal  of  his  ancestors  by  death,  the  crowns  of  the  four  dy- 
nasties. 

But  vast  as  were  the  hereditary  possessions  of  the  young  prince, 
there  was  straightway  added  to  these  (in  15 19),  by  the  vote  of 
the  Electors  of  Germany,  the  sovereignty  of  the  Holy  Roman  Em- 
pire. After  this  election  he  was  known  as  Emperor  Charles  V., 
whereas  hitherto  he  had  borne  the  title  of  Don  Carlos  I.  of  Spain. 

Charles  and  the  Reformation.  —  It  is  Charles'  relations  to  the 
Lutheran  movement  which  constitute  the  significant  feature  of  his 
life  and  work.  Here  his  policies  and  acts  concerned  universal 
history.  It  would  hardly  be  asserting  too  much  to  say  that 
Charles,  at  the  moment  he  ascended  the  Imperial  throne,  held  in 
his  hands  the  fortunes  of  the  Reformation,  so  far  as  regards  the 
countries  of  Southern  Europe.  Whether  these  were  to  be  saved 
to  Rome  or  not,  seemed  at  this  time  to  depend  largely  upon  the 
attitude  which  Charles  should  assume  towards  the  reform  move- 
ment. Fortunately  for  the  Catholic  Church,  the  young  emperor 
placed  himself  at  the  head  of  the  Catholic  party,  and  during  his 


CHARLES'    TWO   CHIEF  ENEMIES.  531 

reign  employed  the  strength  and  resources  of  his  empire  in  repress- 
ing the  heresy  of  the  reformers. 

His  Two  Chief  Enemies.  —  Had  Charles  been  free  from  the 
outset  to  devote  all  his  energies  to  the  work  of  suppressing  the 
Lutheran  heresy,  it  is  difficult  to  see  what  could  have  saved  the  re- 
form doctrines  within  his  dominions  from  total  extirpation.  But 
fortunately  for  the  cause  of  the  reformers,  Charles'  attention, 
during  all  the  first  part  of  his  reign,  was  drawn  away  from  the 
serious  consideration  of  Church  questions,  by  the  attacks  upon  his 
dominions  of  two  of  the  most  powerful  monarchs  of  the  times,  — 
Francis  I.  (15 15-1547)  of  France,  and  Solyman  the  Magnificent 
(1520-1566),  Sultan  of  Turkey.  Whenever  Charles  was  inclined 
to  proceed  to  severe  measures  against  the  Protestant  princes  of 
Germany,  the  threatening  movements  of  one  or  both  of  these 
enemies,  at  times  acting  in  concert  and  alliance,  forced  him  to 
postpone  his  proposed  crusade  against  heretics  for  a  campaign 
against  foreign  foes. 

Rivalry  and  Wars  between  Charles  and  Francis1  (1521- 
1544).  —  Francis  I.  was  the  rival  of  Charles  in  the  contest  for 
Imperial  honors.  When  the  Electors  conferred  the  title  of  em- 
peror upon  the  Spanish  monarch,  Francis  was  sorely  disappointed, 
and  during  all  the  remainder  of  his  reign  kept  up  a  jealous  and 
almost  incessant  warfare  with  Charles,  whose  enormous  posses- 
sions now  nearly  surrounded  the  French  kingdom.  Italy  was  the 
field  of  much  of  the  fighting,  as  the  securing  of  dominion  in  that 
peninsula  was  the  chief  aim  of  each  of  the  rivals. 

The  so-called  First  War  between  Francis  and  the  emperor  was 
full  of  misfortunes  for  Francis.  His  army  was  driven  out  of  North- 
ern Italy  by  the  Imperial  forces;  his  most  skilful  and  trusted 
commander,  the  Constable  of  Bourbon,  turned  traitor  and  went 


1  Table  of  Wars :  — 
First  War  (ended  by  Peace 

of  Madrid) 1521-1526 

Second    War    (ended    by 

Ladies'  Peace)     .     .     .  1 527-1 529 


Third     War     (ended     by 

Truce  of  Nice)   .     .     .  1 536-1 538 
Fourth    War    (ended    by 

Peace  of  Crespy)     .     .  1542-1544 


532  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  SPAIN. 

over  to  Charles,  and  another  of  his  most  valiant  nobles,  the  cele- 
brated Chevalier  Bayard,  the  knight  sans  peur,  sans  reproche, 
"without  fear  and  without  reproach,"  was  killed  ;  while,  to  crown 
all,  Francis  himself,  after  suffering  a  crushing  defeat  at  Pavia,  in 
Italy,  was  wounded  and  taken  prisoner.  In  his  letter  to  his 
mother  informing  her  of  the  disaster,  he  is  said  to  have  laconically 
written,  "All  is  lost  save  honor."  He  was  liberated  by  the  Peace 
of  Madrid  (1526). 

The  most  memorable  incident  of  the  Second  War  between  the 
king  and  the  emperor,  was  the  sack  of  Rome  by  an  Imperial  army, 
made  up  chiefly  of  Lutherans.  Rome  had  not  witnessed  such 
scenes  since  the  terrible  days  of  the  Goth  and  Vandal. 

In  the  Third  War  Francis  shocked  all  Christendom  by  forming 
an  alliance  with  the  Turkish  Sultan,  who  ravaged  with  his  fleets 
the  Italian  coasts,  and  sold  his  plunder  and  captives  in  the  port  of 
Marseilles.  Thus  was  a  Christian  city  shamefully  opened  to  the 
Moslems  as  a  refuge  and  a  slave-market. 

The  Fourth  War,  which  was  the  last  between  the  rivals,  left 
their  respective  possessions  substantially  the  same  as  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  strife,  in  15  21. 

Disastrous  Effects  of  the  Wars.  —  The  results  of  these  royal 
contentions  had  been  extremely  calamitous.  For  a  quarter  of  a 
century  they  had  kept  nearly  all  Europe  in  a  perfect  turmoil,  and 
by  preventing  alliances  of  the  Christian  states,  had  been  the  occa- 
sion of  the  severe  losses  which  Christendom  during  this  period 
suffered  at  the  hands  of  the  Turks.  Hungary  had  been  ravaged 
with  fire  and  sword  ;  Rhodes  had  been  captured  from  the  Knights 
of  St.  John ;  and  all  the  Mediterranean  shores  pillaged,  and  thou- 
sands of  Christian  captives  chained  to  the  oars  of  Turkish  galleys.1 

1  The  worst  feature  of  this  advance  of  the  Saltan's  authority  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean was  the  growth,  under  his  protection,  of  the  power  of  the  Algerian 
pirates.  One  of  the  chief  strongholds  of  the  pirates  on  the  African  coast  was 
Tunis,  which  was  held  by  the  famous  Barbarossa.  In  the  interval  between 
his  second  and  third  wars  with  Francis,  Charles,  with  a  large  army  and  fleet, 
made  an  assault  upon  this  place,  defeated  the  corsair,  and  set  free  20,000 


PERSECUTIONS.  533 

Persecution  of  the  French  Protestants  by  Francis.  —  The 
cessation  of  the  wars  between  Francis  and  Charles  left  each  free 
to  give  his  attention  to  his  heretical  subjects.  And  both  had  work 
enough  on  hand ;  for  while  the  king  and  the  emperor  had  been 
fighting  each  other,  the  doctrines  of  the  reformers  had  been 
spreading  rapidly  in  all  directions  and  among  all  classes. 

The  severest  blow  dealt  by  Henry  against  the  heretics  of  his 
kingdom  fell  upon  the  Vaudois,  or  Waldenses,1  the  inhabitants  of 
a  number  of  hamlets  in  Piedmont  and  Provence.  Thousands  were 
put  to  death  by  the  sword,  thousands  more  were  burned  at  the 
stake,  and  the  land  was  reduced  to  a  wilderness.  Only  a  miser- 
able remnant,  who  found  an  asylum  among  the  mountains,  were 
left  to  hand  down  their  faith  to  later  times. 

Charles'  Wars  with  the  Protestant  German  Princes.  — 
Charles,  on  his  part,  turned  his  attention  to  the  reformers  in 
Germany.  Inspired  by  religious  motives  and  convictions,  and 
apprehensive,  further,  of  the  effect  upon  his  authority  in  Germany 
of  the  growth  there  of  a  confederacy  of  the  Protestant  princes, 
known  as  the  League  of  Schmalkald,  Charles  resolved  to  suppress 
the  reform  movement  by  force.  He  was  at  first  successful,  but  in 
the  end,  the  war  proved  the  most  disastrous  and  humiliating  to 
him  of  any  in  which  he  had  engaged.  Successive  defeats  of  his 
armies  forced  him  to  give  up  his  undertaking  to  make  all  his 
German  subjects  think  alike  in  matters  of  religion. 

The  Religious  Peace  of  Augsburg  (1555).  — In  the  celebrated 
Diet  of  Augsburg,  convened  in  1555  to  compose  the  distracted 
affairs  of  the  German  states,  it  was  arranged  and  agreed  that  every 
prince  should  be  allowed  to  choose  between  the  Catholic  religion 

Christian  captives.  For  this  brilliant  and  knightly  achievement,  the  emperor 
received  great  applause  throughout  Europe.  Just  after  his  third  war  with 
Francis,  the  emperor  made  an  unsuccessful  and  most  disastrous  assault  upon 
Algiers,  another  stronghold  of  the  corsairs. 

1  So  called  from  the  founder  of  the  sect,  Peter  Waldo,  or  Pierre  de  Vaux, 
who  lived  about  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  century. 


534  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  SPAIN. 

and  the  Augsburg  Confession,1  and  should  have  the  right  to  make 
his  religion  the  worship  of  his  people.  This,  it  will  be  noted,  was 
simply  toleration  as  concerns  princes  or  governments.  The  people 
individually  had  no  freedom  of  choice  ;  every  subject  must  follow 
his  prince,  and  think  and  believe  as  he  thought  and  believed. 
Of  course,  this  was  no  real  toleration. 

Even  to  the  article  of  toleration  as  stated  above,  the  Diet  made 
one  important  exception.  The  Catholics  insisted  that  ecclesiastical 
princes,  i.e.,  bishops  and  abbots  who  were  heads  of  states,  on 
becoming  Protestants,  should  lose  their  offices  and  revenues ;  and 
this  provision,  under  the  name  of  the  Ecclesiastical  Reservation, 
was  finally  made  a  part  of  the  treaty.  This  was  a  most  fortunate 
article  for  the  Catholics. 

Abdication  and  Death  of  Charles.  —  While  the  Diet  of  Augs- 
burg was  arranging  the  Religious  Peace,  the  Emperor  Charles  was 
enacting  the  part  of  a  second  Diocletian  (see  p.  331).     There  had 
long  been  forming  in  his  mind  the  purpose  of  spending  his  last 
days    in    monastic    seclusion.      The    disap- 
pointing issue  of  his  contest  with  the  Prot- 
estant  princes   of  Germany,   the  weight   of 
advancing    years,    together    with    menacing 
troubles  which  began  "  to  thicken  like  dark 
clouds    about    the    evening   of   his    reign," 
now   led    the    emperor   to   carry  this   reso- 
lution   into    effect.      Accordingly   he    abdi- 

EMPEROR  CHARLES  THE        .     ,    .       r  r   ,  .  ™  .,.        ., 

F|FTH  cated  in  favor  of  his  son  Philip  the  crown 

,.u  ,    .     .   of  the  Netherlands  (is SO,  and  that  of  Spain 

(After  a  painting  by  Angel  \     JJJ/»  r 

Lizcano.)  and  its  colonies   (1556),   and    then    retired 

to  the  monastery  of  San  Yuste,  situated  in 
a   secluded   region  in   the   western   part   of  Spain   (1556). 

In  his  retreat  at  Yuste,  Charles  passed  the  remaining  short  term 
of  his  life  in  participating  with  the  monks  in  the  exercises  of  relig- 

1  The  "  Augsburg  Confession  "  was  the  formula  of  belief  of  the  adherents  of 
Luther.  It  was  drawn  up  by  the  scholar  Melanchthon,  and  laid  before  the 
Imperial  Diet  assembled  at  Augsburg  by  Charles  V.  in  1530. 


1 


DEATH  OF  CHARLES    V.  535 

ion,  and  in  watching  the  current  of  events  without ;  for  Charles 
never  lost  interest  in  the  affairs  of  the  empire  over  which  he  had 
ruled,  and  Philip  constantly  had  the  benefit  of  his  father's  wisdom 
and  experience. 

There  is  a  tradition  which  tells  how  Charles,  after  vainly  en- 
deavoring to  make  some  clocks  that  he  had  about  him  at  Yuste 
run  together,  made  the  following  reflection  :  "  How  foolish  I  have 
been  to  think  I  could  make  all  men  believe  alike  about  religion, 
when  here  I  cannot  make  even  two  clocks  keep  the  same  time." 

This  story  is  probably  mythical.  Charles  seems  never  to  have 
doubted  either  the  practicability  or  the  policy  of  securing  unifor- 
mity of  belief  by  force.  While  in  retirement  at  Yuste,  he  ex- 
pressed the  deepest  regret  that  he  did  not  burn  Luther  at  Worms. 
He  was  constantly  urging  Philip  to  use  greater  severity  in  dealing 
with  his  heretical  subjects,  and  could  scarcely  restrain  himself  from 
leaving  his  retreat,  in  order  to  engage  personally  in  the  work  of 
extirpating  the  pestilent  doctrines,  which  he  heard  were  spreading 
in  Spain. 

2.   Spain  under  Philip  II.   (i 556-1 598). 

Philip's  Domains.  —  With  the  abdication  of  Charles  V.  the 
Imperial  crown  passed  out  of  the  Spanish  line  of  the  House  of 
Hapsburg.1  Yet  the  dominions  of  Philip  were  scarcely  less  exten- 
sive than  those  over  which  his  father  had  ruled.  All  the  hereditary 
possessions  of  the  Spanish  crown  were  of  course  his.  Then  just 
before  his  father's  abdication  gave  him  these  domains,  he  had 
become  king-consort  of  England  by  marriage  with  Mary  Tudor. 
And  about  the  middle  of  his  reign  he  conquered  Portugal  and 
added  to  his  empire  that  kingdom  and  its  rich  dependencies  in 
Africa  and  the  East  Indies,  —  an  acquisition  which  more  than 
made  good  to  the  Spanish  crown  the  loss  of  the  Imperial  dignity. 
After  this  accession  of  territory,  Philip's  sovereignty  was  acknowl- 
edged by  more  than  100,000,000  persons  —  probably  as  large  a 

1  The  Imperial  crown  went  to  Charles'  brother,  Ferdinand,  of  Austria. 


536  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  SPAIN. 

number  as  was  embraced  within  the  limits  of  the  Roman  empire 
at  the  time  of  its  greatest  extension. 

But  notwithstanding  that  Philip's  dominions  were  so  extensive, 
his  resources  enormous,  and  many  of  the  outward  circumstances 
of  his  reign  striking  and  brilliant,  there  were  throughout  the  period 
causes  at  work  which  were  rapidly  undermining  the  greatness  of 
Spain  and  preparing  her  fall.  By  wasteful  wars  and  extravagant 
buildings  Philip  managed  to  dissipate  the  royal  treasures ;  and  by 
his  tyrannical  course  in  respect  of  his  Moorish,  Jewish,  and  Prot- 
estant subjects,  he  ruined  the  industries  of  the  most  flourishing  of 
the  provinces  of  Spain,  and  drove  the  Netherlands  into  a  desperate 
revolt,  which  ended  in  the  separation  of  the  most  valuable  of  those 
provinces  from  the  Spanish  crown. 

As  the  most  important  matters  of  Philip's  reign  —  namely,  his 
war  against  the  revolted  Netherlands,  and  his  attempt  upon  Eng- 
land with  his  "  Invincible  Armada  "  —  belong  more  properly  to 
the  respective  histories  of  England  and  the  Netherlands,  and  will 
be  treated  of  in  connection  with  the  affairs  of  those  countries  (see 
pp.  558,  564),  we  shall  give  here  only  a  very  little  space  to  the 
history  of  the  period. 

Philip's  War  with  France.  —  Philip  took  up  his  father's  quarrel 
with  France.  He  was  aided  by  the  English,  who  were  persuaded 
to  this  step  by  their  queen,  Mary  Tudor,  now  the  wife  of  the 
Spanish  sovereign.  Fortune  favored  Philip.  The  French  were 
defeated  in  two  great  battles,  and  were  forced  to  agree  to  the 
terms  of  a  treaty  (Peace  of  Cateau-Cambresis,  1559)  so  advan- 
tageous to  Spain  as  to  give  Philip  great  distinction  in  the  eyes  of 
all  Europe. 

Philip's  Crusade  against  the  Moors.  —  It  will  be  recalled  that 
after  the  conquest  of  Granada  the  Moors  were  still  allowed  the 
exercise  of  their  religion  (see  p.  499).  Philip  conceived  it  to  be 
his  duty  to  impose  upon  them  conditions  that  should  thoroughly 
obliterate  all  traces  of  their  ancient  faith  and  manners.  So  he 
issued  a  decree  that  the  Moors  should  no  longer  use  their  native 
tongue ;  and  that  they  should  give  their  children  Christian  names, 


DEFEAT   OF   THE    TURKISH  FLEET.  537 

and  send  them  to  Christian  schools.  A  determined  revolt  fol- 
lowed. Philip  repressed  the  uprising  with  terrible  severity  (1571). 
The  fairest  provinces  of  Spain  were  almost  depopulated,  and  large 
districts  relapsed  into  primeval  wilderness. 

Defeat  of  the  Turkish  Fleet  at  Lepanto  (15  71).  —  Philip  ren- 
dered an  eminent  service  to  civilization  in  helping  to  stay  the  prog- 
ress of  the  Turks  in  the  Mediterranean.  They  had  captured  the 
important  island  of  Cyprus,  and  had  assaulted  the  Hospitallers  at 
Malta,1  which  island  had  been  saved  from  falling  into  the  hands 
of  the  infidels  only  by  the  splendid  conduct  of  the  knights.  All 
Christendom  was  becoming  alarmed.  Pope  Pius  V.  called  upon 
the  princes  of  Europe  to  rally  to  the  defence  of  the  Church.  An 
alliance  was  formed,  embracing  the  Pope,  the  Venetians,  and 
Philip  II.  An  immense  fleet  was  equipped,  and  put  under  the 
command  of  Don  John  of  Austria,  Philip's  half-brother,  a  young 
general  whose  consummate  ability  had  been  recently  displayed  in 
the  crusade  against  the  Moors. 

The  Christian  fleet  met  the  Turkish  squadron  in  the  Gulf  of 
Lepanto,  on  the  western  coast  of  Greece.  The  battle  was  un- 
equalled by  anything  the  Mediterranean  had  seen  since  the  naval 
encounters  of  the  Romans  and  Carthaginians  in  the  First  Punic 
War.  More  than  600  ships  and  200,000  men  mingled  in  the 
struggle.  The  Ottoman  fleet  was  almost  totally  destroyed.  Thou- 
sands of  Christian  captives,  who  were  found  chained  to  the  oars 
of  the  Turkish  galleys,  were  liberated.  All  Christendom  rejoiced 
as  when  Jerusalem  was  captured  by  the  first  crusaders. 

The  battle  of  Lepanto  holds  an  important  place  in  history,  be- 
cause it  marks  the  turning-point  of  the  long  struggle  between  the 
Mohammedans  and  the  Christians,  which  had  now  been  going  on 
for  nearly  one  thousand  years.  The  Ottoman  Turks,  though  they 
afterwards  made  progress  in  some  quarters,  never  recovered  the 

1  After  the  knights  had  been  driven  from  the  island  of  Rhodes  by  the 
Turks  (see  p.  532),  Charles  gave  the  survivors  of  the  Order  the  island  of 
Malta  (1530). 


538  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  SPAIN. 

prestige  they  lost  in  that  disaster,  and  their  authority  and  power 
thenceforward  steadily  declined.1 

The  Death  of  Philip :  Later  Events.  —  In  the  year  1588  Philip 
made  his  memorable  attempt  with  the  so-called  "  Invincible  Ar- 
mada" upon  England,  at  this  time  the  stronghold  of  Protestantism. 
As  we  shall  see  a  little  later,  he  failed  utterly  in  the  undertaking 
(see  p.  558).  Ten  years  after  this  he  died  in  the  palace  of  the 
Escurial.  With  his  death  closed  that  splendid  era  of  Spanish 
history  which  began  with  the  discovery  of  the  New  World  by 
Columbus.  From  this  time  forward  the  nation  steadily  declined 
in  power,  reputation,  and  influence. 

Thus,  under  Philip  III.  ( 1598-162 1),  a  severe  loss,  and  one 
from  which  they  never  recovered,  was  inflicted  upon  the  manu- 
factures and  various  other  industries  of  Spain,  by  the  expulsion  of 
the  Moors,  or  Moriscoes.  More  than  half  a  million  of  the  most 
intelligent,  skilful,  and  industrious  inhabitants  of  the  Peninsula 
were  driven  into  exile.  And  then  in  1609,  the  Protestant  Nether- 
lands, whose  revolt  against  the  tyranny  of  Philip  II.  has  been 
mentioned,  virtually  achieved  their  independence  (see  p.  570). 
In  the  secession  of  these  provinces  the  Spanish  crown  lost  her 
most  valuable  possessions,  and  she  now  sank  rapidly  to  the  posi- 
tion of  a  third  or  fourth  rate  power.2 

1  After  the  battle  of  Lepanto  the  next  most  critical  moment  in  the  history 
of  the  Turkish  conquests  was  in  1683.  In  that  year  the  Turks  besieged  Vienna, 
and  had  all  but  secured  the  prize,  when  the  city  was  relieved  by  the  distin- 
guished Polish  general  Sobieski. 

2  The  loss  of  the  Netherlands  was  followed  in  1639  by  the  loss  of  Portugal. 
During  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeenth  century  Spain  was  involved  in  dis- 
astrous wars  with  France,  and  suffered  a  decline  of  8,000,000  in  her  population. 
After  the  revolt  of  her  American  colonies,  in  the  early  part  of  the  present 
century,  and  her  cession  to  the  United  States  of  Florida  (in  1819),  Spain  was 
almost  shorn  —  she  still  held  Cuba  and  a  few  other  patches  of  territory  scat- 
tered about  the  world  —  of  those  rich  and  magnificent  colonial  possessions 
which  had  been  her  pride  in  the  time  of  her  ascendency. 


THE    TUDOR  PERIOD.  539 


CHAPTER   L. 

THE  TUDORS  AND  THE  ENGLISH   REFORMATION. 

(1485-1603.) 
1.   Introductory. 

The  Tudor  Period. — The  Tudor  period1  in  English  history 
covers  the  sixteenth  century,  and  overlaps  a  little  the  preceding 
and  the  following  century.  It  was  an  eventful  and  stirring  time  for 
the  English  people.  It  witnessed  among  them  great  progress  in 
art,  science,  and  trade,  and  a  literary  outburst  such  as  the  world 
had  not  seen  since  the  best  days  of  Athens.  But  the  great  event 
of  the  period  was  the  Reformation.  It  was  under  the  Tudors 
that  England  was  severed  from  the  spiritual  empire  of  Rome,  and 
Protestantism  firmly  established  in  the  island.  To  tell  how  these 
great  results  were  effected  will  be  our  chief  aim  in  the  present 
chapter. 

The  English  Reformation  first  a  Revolt  and  then  a  Reform. — 
The  Reformation  in  England  was,  more  distinctly  than  elsewhere, 
a  double  movement.  First,  England  was  separated  violently  from 
the  ecclesiastical  empire  of  Rome.  All  papal  and  priestly  authority 
was  cast  off,  but  without  any  essential  change  being  made  in  creed 
or  mode  of  worship.     This  was  accomplished  under  Henry  VIII. 

Secondly,  the  English  Church,  thus  rendered  independent  of 
Rome,  gradually  changed  its  creed  and  ritual.  This  was  effected 
chiefly  under  Edward  VI.  So  the  movement  was  first  a  revolt  and 
then  a  reform. 

The  Revival  of  Learning  in  England.  — The  soil  in  England 

1  The  Tudor  sovereigns  were  Henry  VII.  (1485-1509);  Henry  VIII.  (1509- 
1547);  Edward  VI.  ( 1 547-1 553);  Mary  (1553-1558);  and  Elizabeth  (1558- 
1603). 


540 


THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 


was,  in  a  considerable  measure,  prepared  for  the  seed  of  the 
Reformation  by  the  labors  of  the  Humanists  (see  p.  474).  Three 
men  stand  preeminent  as  lovers  and  promoters  of  the  New  Learn- 
ing.    Their  names  are  Colet,  Erasmus,  and  More. 

Colet  was  leader  and  master  of  the  little  band.  His  generous 
enthusiasm  was  kindled  at  Florence,  in  Italy,  ft  was  an  impor- 
tant event  in  the  history  of  the  Reformation  when  Colet  crossed 
the  Alps  to  learn  Greek  at  the  feet  of  the  Greek  exiles ;  for  on 
his  return  to  England  he  brought  back  with  him  not  only  an  in- 
creased love  for  classical  learning,  but  a  fervent  zeal  for  religious 

reform,  inspired,  it  would  seem,  by 
the  stirring  eloquence  of  Savona- 
rola (see  p.  511). 

Erasmus  was  probably  superior  in 
classical  scholarship  to  any  stu- 
dent of  his  times.  "He  bought 
Greek  books  first,  and  clothes  after- 
wards." His  Greek  testament,  pub- 
lished in  15 16,  was  one  of  the  most 
powerful  agents  concerned  in  bring- 
ing about  the  Reformation.  Indeed, 
his  relation  to  the  reform  movement 
is  well  indicated  by  the  charge  made 
against  him  by  the  enemies  of  the 
Reformation,  who  declared  that 
"Erasmus  laid  the  egg,  and  Luther  hatched  it." 

Thomas  More  was  drawn,  or  rather  forced,  into  political  life, 
and  of  him  and  his  writings  we  shall  have  occasion  to  speak  here- 
after, in  connection  with  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.  (see  p.  549). 

The  Lollards. — Another  special  preparation  for  the  entrance 
into  England  of  the  Reformation  was  the  presence  among  the 
lower  classes  there  of  a  considerable  body  of  Lollards  (see  p. 
490-  Persecution  had  driven  the  sect  into  obscurity,  but  had 
not  been  able  to  extirpate  the  heresy.  In  holding  the  Scriptures 
as  the  sole  rule  of  faith,  and  in  the  maintenance  of  other  doctrines 


ERASMUS. 


UNION  OF  THE  ROSES.  541 

denounced  by  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  the  Lollards  occupied 
a  position  similar  to  that  held  by  the  German  reformers,  and  con- 
sequently, when  the  teachings  of  Luther  were  disseminated  in 
England,  they  received  them  gladly. 

2.  The  Reign  of  Henry  VII.  (1485-1509). 

The  Union  of  the  Roses. — Henry  VII.  and  his  queen  united 
the  long-disputed  titles  of  the  two  Roses  l  (see  p.  488)  ;  but  the 
bitter  feelings  engendered  by  the  contentions  of  the  rival  families 
still  existed.  Particularly  was  there  much  smothered  discontent 
among  the  Yorkists,  which  manifested  itself  in  two  attempts  to 
place  impostors  upon  the  throne,  both  of  which,  however,  were 
unsuccessful. 

Benevolences.  —  Avarice  and  a  love  of  despotic  rule  were  Hen- 
ry's chief  faults.  Much  of  his  attention  was  given  to  heaping  up 
a  vast  fortune.  One  device  adopted  by  the  king  for  wringing 
money  from  his  wealthy  subjects  was  what  was  euphoniously 
termed  Benez>olences.  Magna  Charta  forbade  the  king  to  impose 
taxes  without  the  consent  of  Parliament.  But  Henry  did  not  like 
to  convene  Parliament,  as  he  wished  to  rule  like  the  kings  of  the 
Continent,  guided  simply  by  his  own  free  will.  Furthermore,  his 
title  not  being  above  question,  it  was  his  policy  to  relieve  the 
poorer  classes  of  the  burden  of  tax-paying,  in  order  to  secure  their 
good-will  and  support.  So  Benevolences  were  made  to  take  the 
place  of  regular  taxes.  These  were  nothing  more  nor  less  than 
gifts  extorted  from  the  well-to-do,  generally  by  moral  pressure. 
One  of  Henry's  favorite  ministers,  named  Morton,  was  particularly 
successful  in  his  appeals  for  gifts  of  this  kind.  To  those  who  lived 
splendidly  he  would  say  that  it  was  very  evident  they  were  quite 
able  to  make  a  generous  donation  to  their  sovereign ;  while  to 
others  who  lived  in  a  narrow  and  pinched  way  he  would  repre- 
sent that  their  economical  mode  of  life  must  have  made  them 

1  Henry  represented  the  claims  of  the  House  of  Lancaster,  and  soon  after 
his  coronation  he  married  the  Princess  Elizabeth,  a  daughter  of  Edward  IV., 
and  the  representative  of  th«  claims  of  the  House  of  York. 


542  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

wealthy.  This  famous  dilemma  received  the  name  of  "  Morton's 
Fork." 

Maritime  Discoveries.  —  It  was  during  this  reign  that  great 
geographical  discoveries  enlarged  the  boundaries  of  the  world.  In 
1492  Columbus  announced  to  Europe  the  existence  of  land  to  the 
west.  In  1497  Vasco  da  Gama  sailed  around  the  cape  of  Good 
Hope  and  found  a  water-road  to  the  East  Indies. 

The  same  year  of  this  last  enterprise,  Henry  fitted  out  a  fleet 
under  the  command  of  John  Cabot,  a  Venetian  sailor  doing  busi- 
ness in  England,  and  his  son  Sebastian,  for  exploration  in  the  west- 
ern seas.  The  Cabots  first  touched  at  Newfoundland  (or  Cape 
Breton  Island),  and  then  the  following  year  Sebastian  explored  the 
coast  they  had  run  against,  from  that  point  to  what  is  now  Virginia 
or  the  Carolinas.  They  were  the  first  Europeans,  if  we  except  the 
Northmen,  to  look  upon  the  American  continent,  for  Columbus  at 
this  time  had  seen  only  the  islands  in  front  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 
These  explorations  of  the  Cabots  were  of  great  importance  for  the 
reason  that  they  gave  England  a  title  to  the  best  portion  of  the 
North  American  coast. 

Foreign  Matrimonial  Alliances.  —  The  marriages  of  Henry's 
children  must  be  noted  by  us  here,  because  of  the  great  influence 
these  alliances  had  upon  the  after-course  of  English  history.  A 
common  fear  of  France  caused  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  of  Spain 
and  Henry  to  form  a  protective  alliance.  To  secure  the  perma- 
nency of  the  union  it  was  deemed  necessary  to  cement  it  by  a 
marriage  bond.  The  Spanish  Infanta  was  accordingly  betrothed 
to  Arthur,  Prince  of  Wales.  Unfortunately,  the  prince  died  soon 
after  the  celebration  of  the  nuptials.  The  Spanish  sovereigns,  still 
anxious  to  retain  the  advantages  of  an  English  alliance,  now  urged 
that  the  young  widow  be  espoused  to  Arthur's  brother  Henry,  and 
the  English  king,  desirous  on  his  side  to  preserve  the  friendship 
of  Spain,  assented  to  the  betrothal.  A  rule  of  the  Church,  how- 
ever, which  forbade  a  man  to  marry  his  brother's  widow,  stood  in 
the  way  of  this  arrangement;  but  the  queen-mother  Isabella 
managed  to  secure  a  decree  from  the  Pope  granting  permission 


CARDINAL    WOLSEY.  543 

in  this  case,  and  so  the  young  widow  was  betrothed  to  Prince 
Henry,  afterward  Henry  VIII.  This  alliance  of  the  royal  families 
of  England  and  Spain  led  to  many  important  consequences,  as  we 
shall  learn. 

To  relieve  England  of  danger  on  her  northern  frontier,  Henry 
steadily  pursued  the  policy  of  a  marriage  alliance  with  Scotland. 
His  wishes  were  realized  when  his  eldest  daughter  Margaret  be- 
came the  wife  of  James  IV.,  king  of  that  realm.  This  was  a  most 
fortunate  marriage,  and  finally  led  to  the  happy  union  of  the  two 
countries  under  a  single  crown  (see  p.  601). 

Henry  VII.  died  in  1509,  leaving  his  throne  to  his  son  Henry, 
an  energetic  and  headstrong  youth  of  eighteen  years. 

3.   England  severed  from  the  Papacy  by  Henry  VIII. 
(1509-1547). 

Cardinal  Wolsey.  —  We  must  here,  at  the  opening  of  Henry 
VIII. 's  reign,1  introduce  his  greatest  minister,  Thomas  Wolsey 
(1471-1530).  This  man  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  char- 
acters of  his  generation.  Henry  VIII.  elevated  him  to  the  office 
of  Archbishop  of  York,  and  made  him  lord  chancellor  of  the 
realm.  The  Pope,  courting  the  minister's  influence,  made  him  a 
cardinal,  and  afterwards  papal  legate  in  England.  He  was  now 
at  the  head  of  affairs  in  both  State  and  Church.  His  revenues 
from  his  many  offices  were  enormous,  and  enabled  him  to  assume 
a  style  of  living  astonishingly  magnificent.  His  household  num- 
bered five  hundred  persons ;  and  a  truly  royal  train,  made  up  of 

1  In  15 1 2,  joining  what  was  known  as  the  Holy  League,  —  a  union  against 
the  French  king,  of  which  the  Pope  was  the  head,  —  Henry  made  his  first 
campaign  in  France.  While  Henry  was  across  the  Channel,  James  II.  of 
Scotland  thought  to  give  aid  to  the  French  king  by  invading  England.  The 
Scottish  army  was  met  by  the  English  force  at  Hodden,  beneath  the  Cheviot 
Hills,  and  completely  overwhelmed  (1513).  King  James  was  killed,  and  the 
flower  of  the  Scottish  nobility  were  left  dead  upon  the  field.  It  was  the  most 
terrible  disaster  that  had  ever  befallen  tin-  Scottish  nation.  Scott's  poem 
entitled  Marmion,  a  Tale  of  Flodden  Field,  commemorates  the  battle. 


544 


THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 


bishops  and  nobles,  attended  him  with  great  pomp  and  parade 
wherever  he  went. 

Henry  as  Defender  of  the  Faith.  —  It  was  early  in  the  reign  of 
Henry  VIII.  that  Martin  Luther  tacked  upon  the  door  of  the 
Wittenberg  church  his  epoch-making  theses.  England  was  stirred 
with  the  rest  of  Western  Christendom.  Henry  wrote  a  Latin  trea- 
tise replying  to  the  articles  of  the  audacious  monk.  The  Pope, 
Leo  X.,  rewarded  Henry's  Catholic  zeal  by  conferring  upon  him 
the  title  of  "Defender  of  the  Faith"  (1521).  This  title  was 
retained  by  Henry  after  the  secession  of  the  Church  of  England 
from  the  Papal  See,  and  is  borne  by  his  successors  at  this  day, 
though  they  are  "  defenders  "  of  quite  a  different  faith  from  that 

in  the  defence  of  which   Henry 
first  earned  the  title. 

Henry  seeks  to  be  divorced 
from  Catherine.  —  We  have  now 
to  relate  some  circumstances 
which  changed  Henry  from  a 
zealous  supporter  of  the  Papacy 
into  its  bitterest  enemy. 

Henry's  marriage  with  Cather- 
ine of  Aragon  had  been  prompt- 
ed by  policy  and  not  by  love.  Of 
the  five  children  born  of  the 
union,  all  had  died  save  a  sickly 
daughter  named  Mary.  In  these 
successive  afflictions  which  left  him  without  a  son  to  succeed 
him,  Henry  saw,  or  feigned  to  see,  a  certain  sign  of  Heaven's 
displeasure  because  he  had  taken  to  wife  the  widow  of  his 
brother. 

And  now  a  new  circumstance  arose,  —  if  it  had  not  existed  for 
some  time  previous  to  this.  Henry  conceived  a  violent  passion 
for  Anne  Boleyn,  a  beautiful  and  vivacious  maid  of  honor  in  the 
queen's  household.     This  new  affection  so  quickened  the  king's 


HENRY    VIII     OF    ENGLAND. 
(After  a  painting  by  Carl  Piloty.) 


THE  FALL    OF   WOLSEY.  545 

conscience,  that  he  soon  became  fully  convinced  that  it  was  his 
duty  to  put  Catherine  aside.1 

Accordingly,  Henry  asked  the  Pope,  Clement  VII.,  to  grant 
him  a  divorce.  The  request  placed  Clement  in  a  very  embarrass- 
ing position  ;  for  if  he  refused  to  grant  it,  he  would  offend  Henry ; 
and  if  he  granted  it,  he  would  offend  Charles  V.,  who  was  Cathe- 
rine's relative.  So  Clement  in  his  bewilderment  was  led  to  tem- 
porize, to  make  promises  to  Henry  and  then  evade  them.  At 
last,  after  a  year's  delay,  he  appointed  Cardinal  Wolsey  and  an 
Italian  cardinal  named  Campeggio  as  commissioners  to  hold  a 
sort  of  court  in  England  to  determine  the  validity  of  Henry's 
marriage  to  Catherine.  A  year  or  more  dragged  along  without 
anything  being  accomplished,  and  then  Clement,  influenced  by 
the  Emperor  Charles,  ordered  Henry  and  Catherine  both  to  ap- 
pear before  him  at  Rome.  (Respecting  appeals  to  Rome,  see  p. 
418). 

The  Fall  of  Wolsey.  —  Henry's  patience  was  now  completely 
exhausted.  Becoming  persuaded  that  Wolsey  was  not  exerting 
himself  as  he  might  to  secure  the  divorce,  he  banished  him  from 
the  court.  The  hatred  of  Anne  Boleyn  and  of  others  pursued 
the  fallen  minister.  He  was  deposed  from  all  his  offices  save  the 
archbishopric,  and  eventually  was  arrested  on  the  charge  of  high 
treason.  While  on  his  way  to  London  the  unhappy  minister, 
broken  in  spirits  and  health,  was  prostrated  by  a  fatal  fever.  As 
he  lay  dying,  he  uttered  these  words,  which  have  lived  so  long 
after  him  :  "  Had  I  served  my  God  as  diligently  as  I  have  served 
my  king,  He  would  not  have  given  me  over  in  my  gray  hairs  " 

053O)- 
Thomas   Cromwell.  —  A  man  of  great  power  and  mark  now 

1  Political  considerations,  without  doubt,  had  much  if  not  most  to  do  in 
bringing  Henry  to  this  state  of  mind.  He  was  ready  to  divorce  Catherine  and 
openly  break  with  Spain,  because  the  Emperor  Charles  V.,  to  whom  he  had 
offered  the  hand  of  the  Princess  Mary,  had  married  the  Infanta  of  Portugal, 
and  thus  cast  aside  the  English  alliance.  On  this  point  consult  Seebohm,  The 
Era  of  the  Protestant  A'tTo/it/ioti,  pp.  178-180. 


546  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

rises  to  our  notice.  Upon  the  disgrace  of  Wolsey,  a  faithful 
attendant  of  his  named  Thomas  Cromwell  straightway  assumed  in 
Henry's  regard  the  place  from  which  the  Cardinal  had  fallen.  He 
was  just  the  opposite  of  Wolsey  in  caring  nothing  for  pomp  and 
parade.  For  the  space  of  ten  years  this  wonderful  man  shaped 
the  policy  of  Henry's  government.  What  he  proposed  to  himself 
was  the  establishment  of  a  royal  despotism  upon  the  ruin  of  every 
other  power  in  the  State.  The  executioner's  axe  was  constantly 
wet  with  the  blood  of  those  who  stood  in  his  way,  or  who  in  any 
manner  incurred  his  displeasure. 

It  was  to  the  bold  suggestions  of  this  man  that  Henry  now 
listened,  when  all  other  means  of  gratifying  his  passion  had  been 
tried  in  vain.  Cromwell's  advice  to  the  king  was  to  waste  no 
more  time  in  negotiating  with  the  Pope,  but  at  once  to  renounce 
the  jurisdiction  of  the  Roman  pontiff,  proclaim  himself  Supreme 
Head  of  the  Church  in  England,  and  then  get  a  decree  of  divorce 
from  his  own  courts. 

The  Breach  with  Rome.  —  The  advice  of  Cromwell  was  acted 
upon,  and  by  a  series  of  steps  England  was  swiftly  and  forever 
carried  out  from  under  the  authority  of  the  Roman  See.  Henry 
first  virtually  cut  the  Gordian  knot  by  a  secret  marriage  with  Anne 
Boleyn,  notwithstanding  a  papal  decree  threatening  him  with 
excommunication  should  he  dare  to  do  so.  Parliament,  which  was 
entirely  subservient  to  Henry's  wishes,  now  passed  a  law  known  as 
the  Statute  of  Appeals,  which  made  it  a  crime  for  any  Englishman 
to  carry  a  case  out  of  the  kingdom  to  the  courts  at  Rome.  Cran- 
mer,  a  Cambridge  doctor  who  had  served  Henry  by  writing  a  book 
in  favor  of  the  divorce,  was,  in  accordance  with  the  new  pro- 
gramme, made  archbishop  of  Canterbury.  He  at  once  formed  a 
court,  tried  the  case,  and  of  course  declared  the  king's  marriage 
with  Catherine  null  and  void  from  the  very  first,  and  his  union 
with  Anne  legal  and  right. 

The  Act  of  Supremacy  (1534).  —  The  decisive  step  had  now 
been  taken  :  the  Rubicon  had  been  crossed.  The  Pope  issued  a 
decree  excommunicating  Henry  and  relieving  his  subjects  from 


SUPREME   HEAD    OF   THE    CHURCH.  547 

their  allegiance.  Henry  on  his  part  called  Parliament,  and  a 
celebrated  bill  known  as  the  Act  of  Supremacy  was  passed  (1534). 
This  statute  made  Henry  the  Supreme  Head  of  the  Church  in 
England,  vesting  in  him  absolute  control  over  all  its  offices,  and 
turning  into  his  hands  the  revenues  which  had  hitherto  flowed 
into  the  coffers  of  the  Roman  See.  A  denial  of  the  title  given  the 
king  by  the  statute  was  made  high  treason.  This  statute  laid  the 
foundations  of  the  Anglican  Church. 

Henry  as  Supreme  Head  of  the  Church.  —  Henry  now  set  up 
in  England  a  little  Popedom  of  his  own.  He  drew  up  a  sort  of 
creed  which  everybody  must  believe,  or  at  least  pretend  to  believe. 
The  doctrines  of  purgatory,  of  indulgences,  of  masses  for  the 
dead,  of  pilgrimages,  of  the  adoration  of  images  and  relics,  were 
condemned ;  but  the  doctrines  of  transubstantiation  and  of  con- 
fession to  a  priest  were  retained.  Every  head  of  a  family  and 
every  teacher  was  commanded  to  teach  his  children  or  pupils  the 
Lord's  Prayer,  the  Ten  Commandments,  and  the  new  Creed. 

Thus  was  the  English  Church  cared  for  by  its  self-appointed 
shepherd.  What  it  should  be  called  under  Henry  it  would  be 
hard  to  say.  It  was  not  Protestant ;  and  it  was  just  as  far  from 
being  Catholic. 

The  Suppression  of  the  Monasteries.  —  The  suppression  of  the 
monasteries  was  one  of  Henry's  most  high-handed  measures. 
Several  things  led  him  to  resolve  on  the  extinction  of  these 
religious  houses.  For  one  thing,  he  coveted  their  wealth,  which 
at  this  time  included  probably  one-fifth  of  the  lands  of  the  realm. 
Then  the  monastic  orders  were  openly  or  secretly  opposed  to 
Henry's  claims  of  supremacy  in  religious  matters  ;  and  this  natu- 
rally caused  him  to  regard  them  with  jealousy  and  disfavor.  Hence 
their  ruin  was  planned. 

In  order  to  make  the  act  appear  as  reasonable  as  possible,  it 
was  planned  to  make  the  charge  of  immorality  the  ostensible 
ground  of  their  suppression.  Accordingly  two  royal  commission- 
ers were  appointed  to  inspect  the  monasteries,  and  make  a  report 
upon  what  they  might  see  and  learn.     If  we  may  believe  the 


548  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

report,  the  smaller  houses  were  conducted  in  a  most  shameful 
manner.  The  larger  houses,  however,  were  fairly  free  from  faults. 
Many  of  them  served  as  schools,  hospitals,  and  inns,  and  all  dis- 
tributed alms  to  the  poor  who  knocked  at  their  gates.  But  the 
undoubted  usefulness  and  irreproachable  character  of  the  larger 
foundations  did  not  avail  to  avert  the  indiscriminate  ruin  of  all. 
A  bill  was  passed  which  at  once  dissolved  between  three  and  four 
hundred  of  the  smaller  monasteries,  and  gave  all  their  property  to 
the  king  (1536). 

The  unscrupulous  act  stirred  up  a  rebellion  in  the  north  of 
England,  known  as  the  "  Pilgrimage  of  Grace."  This  was  sup- 
pressed with  great  severity,  and  soon  afterwards  the  larger  mon- 
asteries were  also  dissolved,  their  possessors  generally  surren- 
dering the  property  voluntarily  into  the  hands  of  the  king,  lest  a 
worse  thing  than  the  loss  of  their  houses  and  lands  should  come 
upon  them.1  Pensions  were  granted  to  the  dispossessed  monks, 
which  relieved  in  part  the  suffering  caused  by  the  proceeding. 

A  portion  of  the  confiscated  wealth  of  the  houses  was  used  in 
founding  schools  and  colleges,  and  a  part  for  the  establishment  of 
bishoprics ;  but  by  far  the  greater  portion  was  distributed  among 
the  adherents  and  favorites  of  the  king.  The  leading  houses  of 
the  English  aristocracy  of  to-day,  may,  according  to  Hallam,  trace 
the  title  of  their  estates  back  to  these  confiscated  lands  of  the 
religious  houses.  Thus  a  new  nobility  was  raised  up  whose  inter- 
ests led  them  to  oppose  any  return  to  Rome  ;  for  in  such  an  event 
their  estates  were  liable  of  course  to  be  restored  to  the  monas- 
teries. 

Persecution  of  Catholics  and  Protestants.  —  Our  disapproval 
of  Henry's  unscrupulous  conduct  in  compassing  the  ruin  of  the 
religious  houses  flames  into  hot  indignation  when  we  come  to 
speak  of  his  atrocious  crimes  against  the  lives  and  consciences  of 

1  Altogether  there  were  90  colleges,  1 10  hospitals,  2374  chantries  and 
chapels,  and  645  monasteries  broken  up.  Such  Roman  Catholic  church  prop- 
erty as  was  spared  at  this  time,  was  confiscated  during  the  reign  of  Edward 
VI.,  and  a  portion  of  it  used  to  establish  schools  and  hospitals. 


HENRY'S    WIVES.  549 

his  subjects.  The  royal  reformer  persecuted  alike  Catholics  and 
Protestants.  Thus,  on  one  occasion,  three  Catholics  who  denied 
that  the  king  was  the  rightful  Head  of  the  Church,  and  three  Prot- 
estants who  disputed  the  doctrine  of  the  real  presence  in  the 
sacrament  (a  dogma  which  Henry  had  retained  in  his  creed) ,  were 
dragged  on  the  same  sled  to  the  place  of  execution. 

The  most  illustrious  of  the  king's  victims  were  the  learned  Sir 
Thomas  More  and  the  aged  Bishop  Fisher,  both  of  whom  were 
brought  to  the  block  because  their  consciences  would  not  allow 
them  to  acknowledge  that  the  king  was  rightfully  the  Supreme 
Head  of  the  Church  of  England. 

Henry's  Wives.  —  Henry's  troubles  with  his  wives  form  a  curi- 
ous and  shameful  page  in  the  history  of  England's  kings.  Anne 
Boleyn  retained  the  affections  of  her  royal  husband  only  a 
short  time.  She  was  charged  with  unfaithfulness  and  beheaded, 
leaving  a  daughter  who  became  the  famous  Queen  Elizabeth. 
The  day  after  the  execution  of  Anne  the  king  married  Jane  Sey- 
mour, who  died  the  following  year.  She  left  a  son  by  the  name 
of  Edward.  The  fourth  marriage  of  the  king  was  to  Anne  of 
Cleves,  who  enjoyed  her  queenly  honors  only  a  few  months.  The 
king  becoming  enamoured  of  a  young  lady  named  Catherine  How- 
ard, Anne  was  divorced  on  the  charge  of  a  previous  betrothal, 
and  a  new  alliance  formed.  But  Catherine  was  proved  guilty  of 
misconduct  and  her  head  fell  upon  the  block.  The  sixth  and  last 
wife  of  this  amatory  monarch  was  Catherine  Parr.  She  was  a 
discreet  woman,  and  managed  to  outlive  her  husband. 

His  Death  and  the  Succession.  —  Henry  died  in  1547.  His 
many  marriages  and  divorces  had  so  complicated  the  question  of 
the  succession,  that  Parliament,  to  avoid  disputes  after  Henry's 
death,  had  given  him  power,  with  some  restrictions,  to  settle  the 
matter  by  will.  This  he  did,  directing  that  the  crown  should 
descend  to  his  son  Edward  and  his  heirs ;  in  case  Edward  died 
childless,  it  was  to  go  to  Mary  and  her  heirs,  and  then  to  Eliza- 
beth and  her  heirs. 

Literature  under  Henry  Vm. :   More's  Utopia. —The  most 


550  THE   ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

prominent  literary  figure  of  this  period  is  Sir  Thomas  More.  The 
work  upon  which  his  fame  as  a  writer  mainly  rests  is  his  Utopia,  or 
"  Nowhere,"  a  political  romance  like  Plato's  Republic  or  Sir  Philip 
Sidney's  Arcadia.  It  pictures  an  imaginary  kingdom  away  on  an 
island  beneath  the  equinoctial  in  the  New  World,  then  just  dis- 
covered, where  the  laws,  manners,  and  customs  of  the  people  were 
represented  as  being  ideally  perfect.  In  this  wise  way  More  sug- 
gested improvements  in  social,  political,  and  religious  matters  : 
for  it  was  the  wretchedness,  the  ignorance,  the  social  tyranny,  the 
religious  intolerance,  the  despotic  government  of  the  times  which 
inspired  the  Utopia.  More  did  not  expect,  however,  that  Henry 
would  follow  all  his  suggestions,  for  he  closes  his  account  of  the 
Utopians  with  this  admission  :  "  I  confess  that  many  things  in  the 
commonwealth  of  Utopia  I  rather  wish  than  hope  to  see  adopted 
in  our  own."  And,  indeed,  More  himself,  before  his  death,  ma- 
terially changed  his  views  regarding  religious  persecution.  Al- 
though in  his  book  he  had  expressed  his  decided  disapproval 
of  persecution  for  conscience'  sake,  yet  he  afterwards,  driven  into 
reaction  by  the  terrible  excessess  of  the  Peasants'  War  in  Germany, 
and  by  other  popular  tumults  which  seemed  to  be  the  outgrowth 
of  the  Protestant  movement,  favored  persecution,  and  advised  that 
unity  of  faith  be  preserved  by  the  use  of  force. 

4.  Changes  in  the  Creed  and  Ritual  under  Edward  VI. 
(i547-i553)- 
Changes  in  the  Creed.  —  In  accordance  with  the  provisions  of 
Henry's  will,  his  only  son  Edward,  by  Jane  Seymour,  succeeded 
him.  As  Edward  was  but  a  child  of  nine  years,  the  govern- 
ment was  entrusted  to  a  board  of  regents  made  up  of  both  Prot- 
estants and  Catholics.  But  the  Protestants  usurped  authority  in 
the  body,  and  conducted  the  government  in  the  interests  of  their 
party.  The  young  king  was  carefully  taught  the  doctrines  of  the 
reformers,  and  changes  were  made  in  the  creed  and  service  of  the 
English  Church  which  carried  it  still  farther  away  from  the  Roman 
Catholic   Church.     By  a  royal  decree  all  pictures,  images,  and 


CHANGES  TN  THE   CREED.  551 

crosses  were  cleared  from  the  churches ;  the  use  of  tapers,  holy 
water,  and  incense  were  forbidden ;  the  worship  of  the  Virgin  and 
the  invocation  of  saints  was  prohibited ;  belief  in  purgatory  was 
denounced  as  a  superstition,  and  prayers  for  the  dead  were  inter- 
dicted ;  the  real  or  bodily  presence  of  Christ  in  the  bread  and  wine 
of  the  sacrament  was  denied  ;  the  prohibition  against  the  marriage 
of  the  clergy  was  annulled  (a  measure  which  pleased  the  clergy 
and  reconciled  them  to  the  other  sweeping  innovations)  ;  and 
the  services  of  the  Church,  which  had  hitherto  been  conducted  in 
Latin,  were  ordered  to  be  said  in  the  language  of  the  people. 

In  order  that  the  provision  last  mentioned  might  be  effectually 
carried  out,  the  English  Book  of  Common  Prayer  was  prepared  by 
Archbishop  Cranmer,  and  the  first  copy  issued  in  1549.  This 
book,  which  was  in  the  main  simply  a  translation  of  the  old  Latin 
service-books,  with  the  subsequent  change  of  a  word  here  and  a 
passage  there  to  keep  it  in  accord  with  the  growing  new  doc- 
trines, is  the  same  that  is  used  in  the  Anglican  Church  at  the 
present  time. 

In  1552  were  published  the  well-known  Forty-two  Articles  of 
Religion,  which  formed  a  compendious  creed  of  the  reformed 
faith.  These  Articles,  reduced  finally  to  thirty-nine,  form  the 
present  standard  of  faith  and  doctrine  in  the  Church  of  England. 

Persecutions  to  secure  Uniformity.  —  These  sweeping  changes 
in  the  old  creed  and  in  the  services  of  the  Church  would  have 
worked  little  hardship  or  wrong  had  only  everybody,  as  in  More's 
happy  republic,  been  left  free  to  follow  what  religion  he  would. 
But  unfortunately  it  was  only  away  in  "  Nowhere  "  that  men  were 
allowed  perfect  freedom  of  conscience  and  worship.  By  royal 
edict  all  preachers  and  teachers  were  forced  to  sign  the  Forty-two 
Articles ;  and  severe  enactments,  known  as  "  Acts  for  the  Uni- 
formity of  Service,"  punished  with  severe  penalties  any  departure 
from  the  forms  of  the  new  prayer-book.  The  Princess  Mary,  who 
remained  a  firm  and  conscientious  adherent  of  the  old  faith,  was 
not  allowed  to  have  the  Roman  Catholic  service  in  her  own  private 
chapel.     Even  the  powerful  intercession  of  the  Emperor  Charles  V. 


552 


THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 


availed  nothing.     What  was  considered  idolatry  in  high   places 
could  not  be  tolerated. 

Many  persons  during  the  reign  were  imprisoned  for  refusing  to 
conform  to  the  new  worship  ;  while  two  at  least  were  given  to  the 
flames  as  "  heretics  and  contemners  of  the  Book  of  Common 
Prayer."  Probably  a  large  majority  of  the  English  people  were 
still  at  this  time  good  Catholics  at  heart. 

5.   Reaction  under  Mary  (1553-1558). 

Reconciliation  with  Rome.  —  Upon  the  death  of  Edward,  an 

attempt  was  made,  in 
the  interest  of  the  Prot- 
estant party,  to  place 
upon  the  throne  Lady 
Jane  Grey,1  a  grand- 
niece  of  Henry  VIII. ; 
but  the  people,  knowing 
that  Mary  was  the  right- 
ful heir  to  the  throne, 
rallied  about  her,  and 
she  was  proclaimed 
queen  amidst  great  dem- 
onstrations of  loyalty. 
Soon  after  her  acces- 
sion, she  was  married  to 
Philip  II.  of  Spain. 

Mary  was  an  earnest 
Catholic,  and  her  zeal 
effected  the  full  reestab- 
lishment  of  the  Catholic 
worship  throughout  the 
realm.  Parliament  voted  that  the  nation  should  return  to  its  obe- 
dience to  the  Papal  See ;  and  then  the  members  of  both  houses  fell 

1  The  leaders  of  this  movement  were  executed,  and  Lady  Jane  Grey  was 
also  eventually  brought  to  the  block. 


MARY  TUDOR. 


RECONCILIATION    WITH  ROME.  553 

upon  their  knees  to  receive  at  the  hands  of  the  legate  of  the  Pope 
absolution  from  the  sin  of  heresy  and  schism.  The  sincerity 
of  their  repentance  was  attested  by  their  repeal  of  all  the  acts  of 
Henry  and  of  Edward  by  which  the  new  worship  had  been  set  up 
in  the  land.     The  joy  at  Rome  was  unbounded. 

But  not  quite  everything  done  by  the  reformers  was  undone. 
Parliament  refused  to  restore  the  confiscated  Church  lands,  which 
was  very  natural,  as  much  of  this  property  was  now  in  the  hands 
of  the  lords  and  commoners  (see  p.  548).  Mary,  however,  in 
her  zeal  for  the  ancient  faith,  restored  a  great  part  of  the  property 
still  in  the  possession  of  the  crown,  and  refounded  many  of  the 
ruined  monasteries  and  abbeys. 

Persecution  of  the  Protestants.  —  With  the  reestablishment  of 
the  Roman  worship,  the  Protestants  in  their  turn  became  the  vic- 
tims of  persecution.  The  three  most  eminent  martyrs  of  what  is 
known  as  the  Marian  persecutions  were  Latimer,  Ridley,  and 
Cranmer.  Altogether,  between  two  and  three  hundred  persons 
suffered  death,  during  this  reign,  on  account  of  their  religion. 

For  the  part  she  took  in  the  persecutions  that  marked  her  reign, 
Mary  should  be  judged  not  by  the  standard  of  our  time,  but  by 
that  of  her  own.  Punishment  of  heresy  was  then  regarded,  by  both 
Catholics  and  Protestants  alike,  as  a  duty  which  could  be  neglected 
by  those  in  authority  only  at  the  peril  of  Heaven's  displeasure. 
Believing  this,  those  of  that  age  could  consistently  do  nothing  less 
than  labor  to  exterminate  heresy  with  axe,  sword,  and  fagot. 

The  Loss  of  Calais. — The  marriage  of  Philip  and  Mary  had 
been  earnestly  wished  for  by  the  Emperor  Charles  V.,  in  order 
that  Philip,  in  those  wars  with  France  which  he  well  knew  must 
be  a  part  of  the  bequest  which  he  should  make  to  his  son,  might 
have  the  powerful  aid  of  England.  This  was  Philip's  chief  reason 
in  seeking  the  alliance  ;  and  in  due  time  he  called  upon  Mary  for 
assistance  against  the  French  king.  The  result  of  England's 
participation  in  the  war  was  her  mortifying  loss  of  Calais  (see  p. 
487),  which  the  French,  by  an  unexpected  attack,  snatched  out 
of  the  hands  of  its  garrison  (1558).     The  unfortunate  queen  did 


554 


THE   ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 


not  live  out  the  year  that  marked  this  calamity,  which  she  most 
deeply  deplored. 

6.   Final  Establishment  of    Protestantism  under   Elizabeth 
(1558-1603). 

The  Queen.  —  Elizabeth  was  the  daughter  of  Henry  VIII.  and 
Anne  Boleyn.  She  seems  to  have  inherited  the  characteristics  of 
both  parents ;  hence  the  inconsistencies  of  her  disposition. 


ENTRANCE   OF   QUEEN    ELIZABETH    INTO    LONDON. 
(Showing  the  costumes  of  the  time.) 

When  the  death  of  Mary  called  Elizabeth  to  the  throne,  she 
was  twenty-five  years  of  age.  Like  her  father,  she  favored  the 
reformed  faith  rather  from  policy  than  conviction.  It  was  to  the 
Protestants  alone  that  she  could  look  for  support;  her  title  to 
the  crown  was  denied  by  every  true  Catholic  in  the  realm,  for 
she  was  the  child  of  that  marriage  which  the  Pope  had  forbidden 
under  pain  of  the  anathemas  of  the  Church. 

Elizabeth  possessed  a  strong  will,  indomitable  courage,  admir- 


ELIZABETH'S  MINISTERS.  555 

able  judgment,  and  great  political  tact.  It  was  these  qualities 
which  rendered  her  reign  the  strongest  and  most  illustrious  in  the 
record  of  England's  sovereigns,  and  raised  the  nation  from  a 
position  of  insignificance  to  a  foremost  place  among  the  states  of 
Europe. 

Along  with  her  good  and  queenly  qualities  and  accomplish- 
ments, Elizabeth  had  many  unamiable  traits  and  unwomanly  ways. 
She  was  capricious,  treacherous,  unscrupulous,  ungrateful,  and 
cruel.  She  seemed  almost  wholly  devoid  of  a  moral  or  religious 
sense.  Deception  and  falsehood  were  her  usual  weapons  in  diplo- 
macy. "  In  the  profusion  and  recklessness  of  her  lies,"  declares 
Green,  "  Elizabeth  stood  without  a  peer  in  Christendom." 

Her  Ministers,  —  One  secret  of  the  strength  and  popularity  of 
Elizabeth's  government  was  the  admirable  judgment  she  exercised 
in  her  choice  of  advisers.  Around  her  Council-board  she  gath- 
ered the  wisest  and  strongest  men  to  be  found  in  the  realm.  The 
most  eminent  of  the  queen's  ministers  was  Sir  William  Cecil  (Lord 
Burleigh),  a  man  of  great  sagacity  and  ceaseless  industry,  to  whose 
able  counsel  and  prudent  management  is  largely  due  the  success 
of  Elizabeth's  reign.  He  stood  at  the  head  of  the  Queen's  Coun- 
cil for  forty  years.  His  son  Robert,  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon,  and  Sir 
Francis  Walsingham  were  also  prominent  among  the  queen's 
advisers. 

Reestablishment  of  the  Reformed  Church.  —  As  Mary  undid 
the  work  in  religion  of  Henry  and  Edward,  so  now  her  work  is 
undone  by  Elizabeth.  The  religious  houses  that  had  been  re- 
established by  Mary  were  again  dissolved,  and  Parliament,  by 
two  new  Acts  of  Supremacy  and  Uniformity,  relaid  the  founda- 
tions of  the  Anglican  Church. 

The  Act  of  Supremacy  required  all  the  clergy,  and  every  person 
holding  office  under  the  crown,  to  take  an  oath  declaring  the  queen 
to  be  the  supreme  governor  of  the  realm  in  all  spiritual  as  well  as 
temporal  things,  and  renouncing  the  authority  or  jurisdiction  of 
any  foreign  prince  or  prelate.  For  refusing  to  take  this  oath, 
many   Catholics   during    Elizabeth's    reign    suffered   death,   and 


556  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

many  more  endured  within  the  Tower  the  worse  horrors  of  the 
rack. 

The  Act  of  Uniformity  forbade  any  clergyman  to  use  any  but 
the  Anglican  liturgy,  and  required  every  person  to  attend  the 
Established  Church  on  Sunday  and  other  holy  days.  For  every 
absence  a  fine  of  one  shilling  was  imposed.  The  persecutions 
which  arose  under  this  law  caused  many  Catholics  to  seek  freedom 
of  worship  in  other  countries. 

The  Protestant  Non-Conformists.  —  The  Catholics  were  not 
the  only  persons  among  Elizabeth's  subjects  who  were  opposed  to 
the  Anglican  worship.  There  were  Protestant  non-conformists  — 
the  Puritans  and  the  Separatists  —  who  troubled  her  almost  as 
much  as  the  Romanists. 

The  Puritans  were  so  named  because  they  desired  a  purer  form 
of  worship  than  the  Anglican.  To  these  earnest  reformers  the 
Church  Elizabeth  had  established  seemed  but  half-reformed. 
Many  rites  and  ceremonies,  such  as  wearing  the  surplice  and  mak- 
ing the  cross  in  baptism,  had  been  retained ;  and  these  things,  in 
their  eyes,  appeared  mere  Popish  superstitions.  What  they  wanted 
was  a  more  sweeping  change,  a  form  of  worship  more  like  that  of 
the  Calvinistic  churches  of  Geneva,  in  which  city  very  many  of 
them  had  lived  as  exiles  during  the  Marian  persecution.  They, 
however,  did  not  at  once  withdraw  from  the  Established  Church, 
but  remaining  within  its  pale,  labored  to  reform  it,  and  to  shape 
its  doctrines  and  discipline  to  their  notions. 

The  Separatists  were  still  more  zealous  reformers  than  the  Puri- 
tans :  in  their  hatred  of  everything  that  bore  any  resemblance  to 
the  Roman  worship,  they  flung  away  the  surplice  and  the  Prayer- 
book,  severed  all  connection  with  the  Established  Church,  and 
refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with  it.  Under  the  Act  of  Con- 
formity they  were  persecuted  with  great  severity,  so  that  multi- 
tudes were  led  to  seek  an  asylum  upon  the  continent.  It  was  from 
among  these  exiles  gathered  in  Holland  that  a  little  later  came  the 
passengers  of  the  Mayflower,  —  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  who  laid  the 
foundations  of  civil  liberty  in  the  New  World. 


MARY  STUART.  557 

Mary  Stuart,  Queen  of  Scots.  —  A  large  part  of  the  history  of 
Elizabeth's  reign  is  intertwined  with  the  story  of  her  cousin,  Mary 
Stuart,  Queen  of  Scots.  Mary  Stuart  was  the  daughter  of  James 
V.  of  Scotland,  and  to  her  in  right  of  birth  —  according  to  all 
Catholics  who  denied  the  validity  of  Henry's  marriage  with  Anne 
Boleyn  —  belonged  the  English  crown  next  after  Mary  Tudor. 
Upon  the  death,  in  1560,  of  her  husband  Francis  II.  of  France, 
Mary  gave  up  life  at  the  French  court,  and  returned  to  her  native 
land.  She  was  now  in  her  nineteenth  year.  The  subtle  charm  of 
her  beauty  seems  to  have  bewitched  all  who  came  into  her  pres- 
ence —  save  the  more  zealous  of  the  Protestants,  who  could  never 
forget  that  their  young  sovereign  was  a  Catholic.  The  stern  old 
reformer,  John  Knox,  made  her  life  miserable.  He  was  a  veritable 
Elijah,  in  whose  eyes  Mary  appeared  a  modern  Jezebel.  He  called 
her  a  "  Moabite,"  and  the  "  Harlot  of  Babylon,"  till  she  wept  from 
sheer  vexation.  She  dared  not  punish  the  impudent  preacher,  for 
she  knew  too  well  the  strength  of  the  Protestant  feeling  among 
her  subjects. 

Other  things  now  conspired  with  Mary's  hated  religion  to  alien- 
ate entirely  the  love  of  her  people.  Her  second  husband,  Henry 
Stuart,  Lord  Darnley,  was  murdered.  The  queen  was  suspected 
of  having  some  guilty  knowledge  of  the  affair.  She  was  impris- 
oned and  forced  to  abdicate  in  favor  of  her  infant  son  James. 

Escaping  from  prison,  Mary  fled  into  England  (1568).  Here 
she  threw  herself  upon  the  generosity  of  her  cousin  Elizabeth,  and 
entreated  aid  in  recovering  her  throne.  But  the  part  which  she 
was  generally  believed  to  have  had  in  the  murder  of  her  husband, 
her  disturbing  claims  to  the  English  throne,  and  the  fact  that  she 
was  a  Catholic,  all  conspired  to  determine  her  fate.  She  was 
placed  in  confinement,  and  for  nineteen  years  she  remained  a 
prisoner.  During  all  this  time  Mary  was  the  centre  of  innumer- 
able plots  and  conspiracies  on  the  part  of  the  Catholics,  which 
aimed  at  setting  her  upon  the  English  throne.  The  Pope  aided 
these  conspirators  by  a  bull  excommunicating  Elizabeth,  deny- 
ing her  right  to  the  crown  she  wore,  and  releasing  her  subjects 
from  their  allegiance. 


558  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

Events  just  now  occurring  on  the  continent  tended  to  inflame 
the  Protestants  of  England  with  a  deadly  hatred  against  Mary  and 
her  Catholic  friends  and  abettors.  In  1572  the  Huguenots  of 
France  were  slaughtered  on  St.  Bartholomew's  Day.  In  1584  the 
Prince  of  Orange  fell  at  the  hands  of  a  hired  assassin.  That  there 
were  daggers  waiting  to  take  the  life  of  Elizabeth  was  well  known. 
It  was  evident  that  so  long  as  Mary  lived  the  queen's  life  was  in 
constant  danger.  In  the  feverish  state  of  the  public  mind,  it  was 
natural  that  the  air  should  be  filled  with  rumors  of  plots  of  every 
kind.  Finally,  a  carefully  laid  conspiracy  to  assassinate  Elizabeth 
and  place  Mary  on  the  throne,  was  unearthed.  Mary  was  tried 
for  complicity  in  the  plot,  was  declared  guilty,  and,  after  some 
hesitation,  feigned  or  otherwise,  on  the  part  of  Elizabeth,  was 
ordered  to  the  block  (1587). 

The  Invincible  Armada.  —  The  execution  of  Mary  Stuart  led 
immediately  to  the  memorable  attempt  against  England  by  the 
Spanish  Armada.  Before  her  death  the  Queen  of  Scots  had  be- 
queathed to  Philip  II.  of  Spain  her  claims  to  the  English  crown. 
To  enforce  these  rights,  to  avenge  the  death  of  Mary,  to  punish 
Elizabeth  for  rendering  aid  to  his  rebellious  subjects  in  the  Neth- 
erlands, and  to  deal  a  fatal  blow  to  the  Reformation  in  Europe  by 
crushing  the  Protestants  of  England,  Philip  resolved  upon  making 
a  tremendous  effort  for  the  conquest  of  the  heretical  and  trouble- 
some island.  Vast  preparations  were  made  for  carrying  out  the 
project.  Great  fleets  were  gathered  in  the  harbors  of  Spain,  and 
a  large  army  was  assembled  in  the  Netherlands  to  cooperate  with 
the  naval  armament.  The  Pope,  Sixtus  V.,  blessed  the  enterprise, 
which  was  thus  rendered  a  sort  of  crusade. 

These  threatening  preparations  produced  a  perfect  fever  of 
excitement  in  England ;  for  we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the  Span- 
ish king  was  at  this  time  the  most  powerful  potentate  in  Europe, 
commanding' the  resources  of  a  large  part  of  two  worlds.  Never 
did  Roman  citizens  rise  more  splendidly  to  avert  some  terrible 
peril  threatening  the  republic  than  the  English  people  now  arose 
as  a  single  man  to  defend  their  island-realm  against  the  revengeful 


THE  INVINCIBLE  ARMADA. 


559 


and  ambitious  project  of  Spain.  The  imminent  danger  served  to 
unite  all  classes,  the  gentry  and  the  yeomanry,  Protestants  and 
Catholics.  The  latter  might  intrigue  to  set  a  Mary  Stuart  on  the 
English  throne,  but  they  were  not  ready  to  betray  their  land  into 
the  hands  of  the  hated  Spaniards. 

July  19,  1588,  the  Invincible  Armada,  as  it  was  boastfully  called, 
was  first  descried  by  the  watchmen  on  the  English  cliffs.  It  swept 
up  the  channel  in  the  form  of  a  great  crescent,  seven  miles  in 


■ 

■B 

m 


SPANISH    AND    ENGLISH    WAR-VESSELS   OF   THE   SIXTEENTH   CENTURY. 

width  from  tip  to  tip  of  horn.  The  English  fleet,  commanded  by 
Drake,  Howard,  and  Lord  Henry  Seymour,  disputed  its  advance. 
The  light  build  and  quick  movements  of  the  English  ships  gave 
them  a  great  advantage  over  the  clumsy,  unwieldy  Spanish  galle- 
ons. The  result  was  the  complete  defeat  of  the  immense  Armada, 
and  the  destruction  of  many  of  the  ships.  The  remaining  galleons 
sought  to  escape  by  sailing  northward  around  the  British  Isles ; 
but  a  terrible  tempest  arising,  many  of  the  fleeing  ships  were 
dashed  to  pieces  on  the  Scottish  or  the  Irish  shores.     Barely  one- 


560  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

third  of  the  ships  of  the  Armada  ever  reentered  the  harbors 
whence  they  sailed.  When  intelligence  of  the  woeful  disaster  was 
carried  to  Philip,  he  simply  said,  "  God's  will  be  done ;  I  sent  my 
fleet  to  fight  with  the  English,  not  with  the  elements." 

The  destruction  of  the  Invincible  Armada  was^iot  only  a  terrible 
blow  to  Spanish  pride,  but  an  equally  heavy  blow  to  Spanish 
supremacy  among  the  states  of  Europe.  From  this  time  on, 
Spain's  prestige  and  power  rapidly  declined. 

As  to  England,  she  had  been  delivered  from  a  great  peril ;  and 
as  to  the  cause  of  Protestantism,  it  was  now  safe. 

Maritime  and  Colonial  Enterprises.  —  The  crippling  of  the 
naval  power  of  Spain  left  England  mistress  of  the  seas.  The  little 
island-realm  now  entered  upon  the  most  splendid  period  of  her 
history.  The  old  Norse  blood  of  her  people,  stirred  by  recent 
events,  seemed  to  burn  with  a  feverish  impatience  for  maritime 
adventure  and  glory.  Many  a  story  of  the  daring  exploits  of  Eng- 
lish sea-rovers  during  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  seems  like  a  repetition 
of  some  tale  of  the  old  Vikings.1 

Especially  deserving  of  mention  among  the  enterprises  of  these 
stirring  and  romantic  times  are  the  undertakings  of  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh  (1552-1618).  Several  expeditions  were  sent  out  by  him 
for  the  purpose  of  making  explorations  and  forming  settlements 
in  the  New  World.  One  of  these,  which  explored  the  central 
coasts  of  North  America,  returned  with  such  glowing  accounts  of 
the  beauty  and  richness  of  the  land  visited,  that,  in  honor  of  the 
Virgin  Queen,  it  was  named  "Virginia." 

Sir  Walter  Raleigh  sent  two  colonies  to  the  new  land,  but  they 
both  failed  to  form  permanent  settlements.     It  is  said  that  the 

1  Among  all  these  sea-rovers,  half  explorer,  half  pirate,  Sir  Francis  Drake 
( 1 545-1 595)  was  preeminent.  Before  the  Armada  days  he  had  sailed  around 
the  globe  (1577-1579),  and  for  the  achievement  had  been  knighted  by  Queen 
Elizabeth.  The  whole  life  of  this  sixteenth  century  Viking  was  spent  in  fight- 
ing the  fleets  of  his  sovereign's  enemy,  Philip  II.,  in  capturing  Spanish  treas- 
ure-vessels on  the  high  sea,  and  in  pillaging  the  warehouses  and  settlements 
on  every  Spanish  shore  in  the  Old  and  the  New  World. 


DEATH  OF  THE   QUEEN.  561 

returning  colonists  first  acquainted  the  English  with  the  Indian 
custom  of  smoking  tobacco,  and  that  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  made  the 
practice  popular.  This  may  be  true  ;  yet  prior  to  this,  Europeans 
had  acquired  a  knowledge  of  the  plant  and  some  of  its  uses 
through  Spanish  explorers  and  settlers.  At  this  same  time  also, 
the  potato,  likewise  a  native  product  of  the  New  World,  was  intro- 
duced into  the  British  Isles. 

The  Queen's  Death. — The  closing  days  of  Elizabeth's  reign 
were,  to  her  personally,  dark  and  gloomy.  She  seemed  to  be 
burdened  with  a  secret  grief,1  as  well  as  by  the  growing  infirmities 
of  age.  She  died  March  24,  1603,  in  the  seventieth  year  of  her 
age,  and  the  forty-fifth  of  her  reign.  With  her  ended  the  Tudor 
line  of  English  sovereigns. 

Literature  of  the  Elizabethan  Era. 

Influences  favorable  to  Literature.  —  The  years  covered  by 
the  reign  of  Elizabeth  constitute  the  most  momentous  period 
in  history.  It  was  the  age  when  Europe  was  most  deeply  stirred 
by  the  Reformation.  It  was,  too,  a  period  of  marvellous  physi- 
cal and  intellectual  expansion  and  growth.  The  discoveries  of 
Columbus  and  Copernicus  had  created,  as  Froude  affirms,  "  not 
in  any  metaphor,  but  in  plain  and  literal  speech,  a  new  heaven 
and  a  new  earth."  The  New  Learning  had,  at  the  same  time,  dis- 
covered the  old  world  —  had  revealed  an  unsuspected  treasure  in 
the  philosophies  and  literatures  of  the  past. 

No  people  of  Europe  felt  more  deeply  the  stir  and  movement 
of  the  times,  nor  helped  more  to  create  this  same  stir  and  move- 
ment, than  the  English  nation.  There  seemed  to  be  nothing  too 
great  or  arduous  for  them  to  undertake.  They  made  good  their 
resistance  to  the  Roman  See ;    they  humbled  the  pride  of  the 

1  In  1601  she  sent  to  the  block  her  chief  favorite,  the  Earl  of  Essex,  who  had 
been  found  guilty  of  treason.  She  wished  to  spare  him,  and  probably  would 
have  done  so,  had  a  token  which  he  sent  her  from  his  prison  reached  her. 
Read  the  story  as  told  in  all  the  histories  of  England. 


562  THE  ENGLISH  REFORMATION. 

strongest  monarch  in  Christendom ;  they  sailed  round  the  globe, 
and  penetrated  all  its  seas. 

An  age  of  such  activity  and  achievement  almost  of  necessity 
gives  birth  to  a  strong  and  vigorous  literature.  And  thus  is  ex- 
plained, in  part  at  least,  how  the  English  people  during  this  period 
should  have  developed  a  literature  of  such  originality  and  richness 
and  strength  as  to  make  it  the  prized  inheritance  of  all  the 
world. 

The  Writers. — To  make  special  mention  of  all  the  great  writers 
who  adorned  the  Elizabethan  era  would  carry  us  quite  beyond  the 
limits  of  our  book.  Having  said  something  of  the  influences  under 
which  they  wrote,  we  will  simply  add  that  this  age  was  the  age  of 
Shakespeare  and  Spenser  and  Bacon.1 

1  William  Shakespeare  (1564-1616);  Edmund  Spenser  (15527-1599) ; 
Francis  Bacon  (1561-1626).  Shakespeare  and  Bacon,  it  will  be  noticed,  out- 
lived Elizabeth.  Two  other  names  hold  a  less  prominent  place,  —  that  of  Sir 
Philip  Sidney  (1 554-1 586),  the  courtly  knight,  who  wrote  the  Arcadia,  a  sort 
of  pastoral  romance,  and  A  Defence  of  Poesy,  a  work  intended  to  counteract 
the  Puritanical  spirit  then  rising;  and  that  of  Richard  Hooker  (1553-1600), 
who  in  his  Ecclesiastical  Polity  defends  the  Anglican  Church. 


REDUCED    FAC-SIMILE  OF  THE   SIGNATURE   OF   QUEEN    ELIZABETH. 


THE    COUNTRY.  563 


CHAPTER   LI. 

THE   REVOLT  OF  THE  NETHERLANDS:    RISE  OF  THE  DUTCH 

REPUBLIC. 

(1572-1609.) 

The  Country.  —  The  term  Netherlands  (low-lands)  was  for- 
merly applied  to  all  that  low,  marshy  district  in  the  northwest  of 
Europe,  sunk  much  of  it  below  the  level  of  the  sea,  now  occupied 
by  the  kingdoms  of  Holland  and  Belgium.  The  entire  strip  of 
land  is  simply  the  delta  accumulations  of  the  Rhine  and  other 
rivers  emptying  into  the  North  Sea.  Originally  it  was  often  over- 
flowed by  its  streams  and  inundated  by  the  ocean.  But  this  un- 
promising morass,  protected  at  last  by  heavy  dykes  against  the 
invasions  of  the  ocean  and  the  overflow  of  its  streams,  was 
destined  to  become  the  site  of  cities  which  at  one  period  were  the 
richest  and  most  potent  of  Europe,  and  the  seat  of  one  of  tShe 
foremost  commonwealths  of  modern  times. 

No  country  in  Europe  made  greater  progress  in  civilization  dur- 
ing the  mediaeval  era  than  the  Netherlands.  At  the  opening  of 
the  sixteenth  century  they  contained  a  crowded  and  busy  popula- 
tion of  3,000,000  souls.  The  ancient  marshes  had  been  trans- 
formed into  carefully  kept  gardens  and  orchards.  The  walled 
cities  alone  numbered  between  two  and  three  hundred. 

The  Low  Countries  under  Charles  V.  (15 15-1555).  —  The 
Netherlands  were  part  of  those  possessions  over  which  Charles  V. 
ruled  by  hereditary  right.  Though  Charles  could  not  prevent  the 
growth  of  Protestantism  in  Germany,  he  resolved  to  root  out  the 
heresy  from  his  hereditary  possessions  of  the  Netherlands.  By 
an  Imperial  edict  he  condemned  to  death  all  persons  presuming 
to  read  the  Scriptures,  or  even  to  discuss  religious  topics.  The 
Inquisition  was  introduced,  and  thousands  perished  at  the  stake 
and  upon  the  scaffold,  or  were  strangled,  or  buried  alive.     But 


% 


564  THE  REVOLT  OF  THE  NETHERLANDS. 

when  Charles  retired  to  the  monastery  at  Yuste  (see  p.  534),  the 
reformed  doctrines  were,  notwithstanding  all  his  efforts,  far  more 
widely  spread  and  deeply  rooted  in  the  Netherlands  than  when 
he  entered  upon  their  extirpation  by  fire  and  sword. 

Accession  of  Philip  II.  —  In  1555,  in  the  presence  of  an  august 
and  princely  assembly  at  Brussels,  and  amidst  the  most  imposing 
and  dramatic  ceremonies,  Charles  V.  abdicated  the  crown  whose 
weight  he  could  no  longer  bear,  and  placed  the  same  upon  the 
head  of  his  son  Philip  (see  p.  534),  who  was  a  most  zealous 
Catholic.  Philip  remained  in  the  Netherlands  after  his  coronation 
four  years,  employing  much  of  his  time  in  devising  means  to  root 
out  the  heresy  of  Protestantism.  In  1559  he  set  sail  for  Spain, 
never  to  return. 

Long  live  the  Beggars.  —  Upon  his  departure  from  the  Nether- 
lands Philip  entrusted  their  government  to  his  half-sister,  Margaret, 
Duchess  of  Parma,  as  Regent.  Under  the  administration  of  Mar- 
garet (1559—1567)  the  persecution  of  the  Protestants  went  on 
with  renewed  bitterness.  Philip  declared  that  "  he  would  rather 
lose  a  hundred  thousand  lives,  were  they  all  his  own,  than  allow 
the  smallest  deviation  from  the  standards  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church."  Thousands  fled  the  country,  many  of  the  fugitives  find- 
ing a  home  in  England.  At  last  the  nobles  leagued  together  for 
the  purpose  of  resisting  the  Inquisition.  They  demanded  of  the 
Regent  a  redress  of  grievances.  When  the  petition  was  presented 
to  the  Duchess,  she  displayed  great  agitation,  whereupon  one  of 
her  councillors  exclaimed,  "  Madam,  are  you  afraid  of  a  pack  of 
beggars?" 

The  expression  was  carried  to  the  nobles,  who  were  assembled 
at  a  banquet.  Immediately  one  of  their  number  suspended  a  beg- 
gar's wallet  from  his  neck,  and  filling  a  wooden  bowl  with  wine, 
proposed  the  toast,  "  Long  live  the  Beggars."  The  name  was 
tumultuously  adopted,  and  became  the  party  designation  of  the 
patriot  Netherlanders  during  their  long  struggle  with  the  Spanish 
power. 

The  Iconoclasts  (1566). — Affairs  now  rapidly  verged  towards 


THE  ICONOCLASTS.  565 

violence  and  open  revolt.  The  only  reply  of  the  government  to 
the  petition  of  the  nobles  was  a  decree  termed  the  Moderation, 
which  substituted  hanging  for  burning  in  the  case  of  condemned 
heretics.  The  pent-up  indignation  of  the  people  at  length  burst 
forth  in  an  uncontrollable  fury.  They  gathered  in  great  mobs, 
and  arming  themselves  with  whatever  implements  they  could  first 
seize,  proceeded  to  demolish  every  image  they  could  find  in  the 
churches  throughout  the  country.  The  rage  of  the  insurgents  was 
turned  in  this  direction,  because  in  their  eyes  these  churches  rep- 
resented the  hated  Inquisition  under  which  they  were  suffering. 
Scarcely  a  church  in  all  the  Netherlands  escaped.  The  monas- 
teries, too,  were  sacked,  their  libraries  burned,  and  the  inmates 
driven  from  their  cloisters.  In  the  province  of  Flanders  alone 
there  were  four  hundred  sacred  buildings  visited  by  the  mob,  and 
sacked.  The  tempest  destroyed  innumerable  art  treasures,  which 
have  been  as  sincerely  mourned  by  the  lovers  of  the  beautiful  as 
the  burned  rolls  of  the  Alexandrian  Library  have  been  lamented 
by  the  lovers  of  learning. 

These  image-breaking  riots  threw  Philip  into  a  perfect  transport 
of  rage.  He  tore  his  beard,  and  exclaimed,  "  It  shall  cost  them 
dear  !     I  swear  it  by  the  soul  of  my  father  !  " 

The  Duke  of  Alva  and  William  of  Orange.  —  The  year  follow- 
ing the  outbreak  of  the  Iconoclasts,  Philip  sent  to  the  Netherlands 
a  veteran  Spanish  army,  headed  by  the  Duke  of  Alva.  The  duke 
was  one  of  the  ablest  generals  of  the  age ;  and  the  intelligence  of 
his  coming  threw  the  provinces  into  a  state  of  the  greatest  agitation 
and  alarm.  Those  who  could  do  so  hastened  to  get  out  of  the 
country.  William  the  Silent,  Prince  of  Orange,  fled  to  Germany, 
where  he  began  to  gather  an  army  of  volunteers  for  the  struggle 
which  he  now  saw  to  be  inevitable.  Egmont  and  Horn,  noble- 
men of  high  rank  and  great  distinction,  were  seized,  cast  into 
prison,  and  afterwards  beheaded  (1568). 

The  eyes  of  all  Netherlander  were  now  turned  to  the  Prince 
of  Orange  as  their  only  deliverer.  Towards  the  close  of  the  year 
1568,  he  marched  from  Germany  against  Alva,  at  the  head  of  an 


566 


THE  REVOLT   OF  THE  NETHERLANDS. 


WILLIAM    OF   ORANGE    (the  Silent). 
(After  a  copper-plate  by  William  Jacobz  Delff,  1580-1638.) 


army  of  30,000  men,  which  he  had  raised  and  equipped  princi- 
pally at  his  own  expense.  The  war  was  now  fully  joined.  The 
struggle  lasted  for  more  than  a  generation,  —  for  thirty-seven  years. 

The  Spanish  armies  were 
commanded  successively  by 
the  most  experienced  and 
distinguished  generals  of  Eu- 
rope,—  the  Duke  of  Alva, 
Don  John  of  Austria  (the 
conqueror  of  the  Moors  and 
the  hero  of  the  great  naval 
fight  of  Lepanto),  and  the 
Duke  of  Parma;  but  the 
Prince  of  Orange  coped  ably 
with  them  all,  and  in  the 
masterly  service  which  he 
rendered  his  country,  thus 
terribly  assaulted,  earned 
the  title  of  "the   Founder  of  Dutch   Liberties." 

Isolation  of  the  Provinces.  —  The  Netherlander  sustained  the 
unequal  contest  almost  single-handed ;  for,  though  they  found 
much  sympathy  among  the  Protestants  of  Germany,  France,  and 
England,  they  never  received  material  assistance  from  any  of  these 
countries,  excepting  England,  and  it  was  not  until  late  in  the  strug- 
gle that  aid  came  from  this  source.  Elizabeth  did,  indeed,  at  first 
furnish  the  patriots  with  secret  aid,  and  opened  the  ports  of  Eng- 
land to  the  "  Beggars  of  the  Sea  " ;  but  after  a  time  the  fear  of 
involving  herself  in  a  war  with  Philip  led  her  to  withhold  for  a  long 
period  all  contributions  and  favors.  As  regards  the  German  states, 
they  were  too  much  divided  among  themselves  to  render  efficient 
aid ;  and  just  at  the  moment  when  the  growing  Protestant  senti- 
ment in  France  encouraged  the  Netherlanders  to  look  for  help 
from  the  Huguenot  party  there,  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew 
extinguished  forever  all  hope  of  succor  from  that  quarter  (see 
p.  576).     So  the  little  revolted  provinces  were  left  to  carry  on  un- 


PACIFICATION  OF  GHENT.  567 

aided,  as  best  they  might,  a  contest  with  the  most  powerful  mon- 
arch of  Christendom. 

The  details  of  this  memorable  struggle  we  must,  of  course,  leave 
unnoticed,  and  hurry  on  to  the  issue  of  the  matter.  In  so  doing 
we  shall  pass  unnoticed  many  memorable  sieges  and  battles.1 

Pacification  of  Ghent  (1576). — The  year  1576  was  marked  by 
a  revolt  of  the  Spanish  soldiers,  on  account  of  their  not  receiving 
their  pay,  the  costly  war  having  drained  Philip's  treasury.  The 
mutinous  army  marched  through  the  land,  pillaging  city  after  city," 
and  paying  themselves  with  the  spoils.  The  beautiful  city  of 
Antwerp  was  ruined.  The  horrible  massacre  of  its  inhabitants, 
and  the  fiendish  atrocities  committed  by  the  frenzied  soldiers, 
caused  the  awful  outbreak  to  be  called  the  "  Spanish  Fury." 

The  terrible  state  of  affairs  led  to  an  alliance  between  Holland 
and  Zealand  and  the  other  fifteen  provinces  of  the  Netherlands, 
known  in  history  as  the  Pacification  of  Ghent  (1576).  The  resist- 
ance to  the  Spanish  crown  had  thus  far  been  carried  on  without 
concerted  action  among  the  several  states,  the  Prince  of  Orange 
having  hitherto  found  it  impossible  to  bring  the  different  provinces 
to  agree  to  any  plan  of  general  defence.  But  the  awful  experi- 
ences of  the  Spanish  Fury  taught  the  necessity  of  union,  and  led 
all  the  seventeen  provinces  solemnly  to  agree  to  unite  in  driving  the 
Spaniards  from  the  Netherlands,  and  in  securing  full  liberty  for  all 
in  matters  of  faith  and  worship.  William  of  Orange,  with  the  title 
of  Stadtholder,  was  placed  at  the  head  of  the  union.  It  was 
mainly  the  strong  Catholic  sentiment  in  the  Southern  provinces 
that  had  prevented  such  a  union  and  pacification  long  before. 

The  Union  of  Utrecht  (1579). — With  the  Spanish  forces 
under  the  lead  first  of  Don  John  of  Austria,  the  hero- victor  of 
I^epanto,  and  afterwards  of  Prince  Alexander  of  Parma,  a  com- 
mander of  most  distinguished  ability,  the  war  now  went  on  with 
increased  vigor,  fortune,  with  many  vacillations,  inclining  to  the 
side  of  the  Spaniards.     Disaffection  arose  among  the  Netherland- 

1  Read  in  Motley's  Rise  of  the  Dutch  Republic  the  siege  and  sack  of  Har- 
lem and  the  relief  of  Leyden. 


568  THE  REVOLT   OF   THE  NETHERLANDS. 

ers,  the  outcome  of  which  was  the  separation  of  the  provinces. 
The  Prince  of  Orange,  seeing  the  impossibility  of  uniting  all  the 
states,  devoted  his  efforts  to  effecting  a  confederation  of  the 
Northern  ones.  His  endeavors  were  fortunately  crowned  with 
success,  and  the  seven  Protestant  states  of  the  North,1  the  chief  of 
which  were  Holland  and  Zealand,  by  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  (1579), 
were  united  in  a  permanent  confederation,  known  as  the  Seven 
United  Provinces  of  the  Netherlands.  In  this  league  was  laid  the 
foundation  of  the  Dutch  Republic. 

Fortunate  would  it  have  been  for  the  Netherlands,  could  all  of 
the  states  at  this  time  have  been  brought  to  act  in  concert. 
Under  the  leadership  of  the  Prince  of  Orange,  the  seventeen  prov- 
inces might  have  been  consolidated  into  a  powerful  nation,  that 
might  now  be  reckoned  among  the  great  powers  of  Europe. 

The  "  Ban"  and  the  "  Apology."  — William  of  Orange  was,  of 
course,  the  animating  spirit  of  the  confederacy  formed  by  the 
treaty  of  Utrecht.  In  the  eyes  of  Philip  and  his  viceroys  he  ap- 
peared the  sole  obstacle  in  the  way  of  the  pacification  of  the  prov- 
inces and  their  return  to  civil  and  ecclesiastical  obedience.  In 
vain  had  Philip  sent  against  him  the  ablest  and  most  distinguished 
commanders  of  the  age ;  in  vain  had  he  endeavored  to  detach 
him  from  the  cause  of  his  country  by  magnificent  bribes  of  titles, 
offices,  and  fortune. 

Philip  now  resolved  to  employ  assassination  for  the  removal  of 
the  invincible  general  and  the  incorruptible  patriot.  He  published 
a  ban  against  the  prince,  declaring  him  an  outlaw,  and  offering  to 
any  one  who  should  kill  him  the  pardon  of  all  his  sins,  a  title  of 
nobility,  and  25,000  gold  crowns. 

The  prince  responded  to  the  infamous  edict  in  a  remarkable 
paper,  entitled  "The  Apology  of  the  Prince  of  Orange,"  —  the 

1  The  ten  Catholic  provinces  of  the  South,  although  they  continued  their 
contest  with  Philip  a  little  longer,  ultimately  submitted  to  Spanish  tyranny.  A 
portion  of  these  provinces  were  absorbed  by  France,  while  the  remainder, 
after  varied  fortunes  amidst  the  revolutions  and  dynastic  changes  of  the 
European  states,  finally  became  the  present  kingdom  of  Belgium. 


ASSASSINATION  OF  THE  PRINCE    OF  ORANGE.        569 

most  terrible  arraignment  of  tyranny  that  was  ever  penned.  The 
"Apology  "  was  scattered  throughout  Europe,  and  everywhere  pro- 
duced a  profound  impression.  The  friends  of  the  prince,  while 
admiring  his  boldness,  were  filled  with  alarm  for  his  safety. 
Their  apprehensions,  as  the  issue  shows,  were  not  unfounded. 

Assassination  of  the  Prince  of  Orange.  — "  The  ban  soon 
bore  fruit."  Upon  the  ioth  day  of  July,  1584,  five  previous  un- 
successful attempts  having  been  made  upon  his  life,  the  Prince  of 
Orange  was  fatally  shot  by  an  assassin.  The  heirs  of  the  murderer 
received  substantially  the  reward  which  had  been  offered  in  the 
ban,  being  enriched  with  the  estates  of  the  prince,  and  honored 
by  elevation  to  the  ranks  of  the  Spanish  nobility. 

The  character  of  William  the  Silent  is  one  of  the  most  admir- 
able portrayed  in  all  history.1  His  steadfast  and  unselfish  devotion 
to  the  cause  of  his  country  deservedly  won  for  him  the  love  of  all 
classes.     His  people  fondly  called  him  "  Father  William." 

Prince  Maurice :  Sir  Philip  Sidney.  —  Severe  as  was  the  blow 
sustained  by  the  Dutch  patriots  in  the  death  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange,  they  did  not  lose  heart,  but  continued  the  struggle  with 
the  most  admirable  courage  and  steadfastness.  Prince  Maurice, 
a  youth  of  seventeen  years,  the  second  son  of  William,  was  chosen 
Stadtholder  in  his  place,  and  proved  himself  a  worthy  son  of  the 
great  chief  and  patriot.  The  war  now  proceeded  with  unabated 
fury.  The  Southern  provinces  were,  for  the  most  part,  in  the 
hands  of  the  Spaniards,  while  the  revolutionists  held  control,  in  the 
main,  of  the  Northern  states. 

Substantial  aid  from  the  English  now  came  to  the  struggling 
Hollanders.  Queen  Elizabeth,  alarmed  by  the  murder  of  the 
Prince  of  Orange,  —  for  she  well  knew  that  hired  agents  of  the 
king  of  Spain  watched   likewise  for  her  life,  —  openly  espoused 

1  He  was  not,  however,  without  faults.  The  most  serious  of  these  was  his 
habit  of  dissimulation.  Some  charge  to  this  the  separation  of  the  Northern 
and  Southern  provinces  after  the  Pacification  of  Ghent.  The  Southern  prov- 
inces would  not  trust  the  "  double-dealer."  For  references  to  various  writers 
on  this  point,  consult  Young's  History  of  the  Netherlands,  p.  320. 


570  THE  REVOLT   OF   THE  NETHERLANDS. 

the  cause  of  the  Dutch.  Among  the  English  knights  who  led 
the  British  forces  sent  into  the  Netherlands  was  the  gallant  Sir 
Philip  Sidney,  the  "  Flower  of  Chivalry."  At  the  siege  of  Zutphen 
(1586),  he  received  a  mortal  wound.  A  little  incident  that  oc- 
curred as  he  rode  from  the  field,  suffering  from  his  terrible  hurt, 
is  always  told  as  a  memorial  of  the  gentle  knight.  A  cup  of  water 
having  been  brought  him,  he  was  about  to  lift  it  to  his  lips,  when 
his  hand  was  arrested  by  the  longing  glance  of  a  wounded  soldier 
who  chanced  at  that  moment  to  be  carried  past.  "Give  it  to 
him,"  said  the  fainting  knight ;  "  his  necessity  is  greater  than 
mine." 

Progress  of  the  War:  Treaty  of  1609. — The  circle  of  war 
grew  more  and  more  extended.  France  as  well  as  England 
became  involved,  both  fighting  against  Philip,  who  was  now  laying 
claims  to  the  crowns  of  both  these  countries.  The  struggle  was 
maintained  on  land  and  on  sea,  in  the  Old  World  and  in  the  New. 
The  English  fleet,  under  the  noted  Sir  Francis  Drake  (see  p. 
560,  n.),  ravaged  the  Spanish  settlements  in  Florida  and  the  West 
Indies,  and  intercepted  the  treasure-ships  of  Philip  returning  from 
the  mines  of  Mexico  and  Peru  ;  the  Dutch  fleet  wrested  from  Spain 
many  of  her  possessions  in  the  East  Indies  and  among  the  islands 
of  the  South  Pacific. 

Europe  at  last  grew  weary  of  the  seemingly  interminable  strug- 
gle, and  the  Spanish  commanders  becoming  convinced  that  it  was 
impossible  to  reduce  the  Dutch  rebels  to  obedience  by  force  of 
arms,  negotiations  were  entered  into,  and  by  the  celebrated  treaty 
of  1 609,  comparative  peace  was  secured  to  Christendom. 

The  treaty  of  1609  was  in  reality  an  acknowledgment  by  Spain 
of  the  independence  of  the  United  Provinces  of  the  Netherlands, 
although  the  Spanish  king  was  so  unwilling  to  admit  the  fact  of 
his  being  unable  to  reduce  the  rebel  states  to  submission,  that  the 
treaty  was  termed  simply  "  a  truce  for  twelve  years."  Spain  did 
not  formally  acknowledge  their  independence  until  forty  years 
afterwards,  in  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  at  the  end  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  (1648)  (see  p.  586). 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   THE  PROVINCES.  571 

Development  of  the  Provinces  dnring  the  War.  —  One  of  the 
most  remarkable  features  of  the  war  for  Dutch  independence  was 
the  vast  expansion  of  the  trade  and  commerce  of  the  revolted 
provinces,  and  their  astonishing  growth  in  population,  wealth,  and 
resources,  while  carrying  on  the  bitter  and  protracted  struggle. 
When  the  contest  ended,  notwithstanding  the  waste  of  war,  the 
number  of  inhabitants  crowded  on  that  little  patch  of  sea-bottom 
and  morass  constituting  the  Dutch  Republic,  was  equal  to  the 
entire  population  of  England;  that  is  to  say,  to  three  or  four 
millions.  But  the  home-land  was  only  a  small  part  of  the  domin- 
ions of  the  commonwealth.  Through  the  enterprise  and  audacity 
of  its  bold  sailors,  it  had  made  extensive  acquisitions  in  the  East 
Indies  and  other  parts  of  the  world,  largely  at  the  expense  of  the 
Spanish  and  the -Portuguese  colonial  possessions.  The  commerce 
of  the  little  republic  had  so  expanded  that  more  than  one  hundred 
thousand  of  its  citizens  found  a  home  upon  the  sea.  No  idlers  or 
beggars  were  allowed  a  place  in  the  industrious  commonwealth. 
And  hand  in  hand  with  industry  went  intelligence.  Throughout 
the  United  Provinces  it  was  rare  to  meet  with  a  person  who  could 
not  both  read  and  write. 


572  THE  HUGUENOT   WARS. 


CHAPTER    LII. 

THE  HUGUENOT  WARS  IN  FRANCE, 
(i  562-1629.) 

Beginning  of  the  Reformation  in  France.  —  Before  Luther 
posted  his  ninety-five  theses  at  Wittenberg,  there  appeared  in  the 
University  of  Paris  and  elsewhere  in  France  men  who,  from  their 
study  of  the  Scriptures,  had  come  to  entertain  opinions  very  like 
those  of  the  German  reformer.  The  land  which  had  been  the 
home  of  the  Albigenses  was  again  filled  with  heretics.  The  move- 
ment thus  begun  received  a  fresh  impulse  from  the  uprising  in 
Germany  under  Luther. 

The  Reformation  in  France,  as  elsewhere,  brought  dissension, 
persecution,  and  war.  We  have  already  seen  how  Francis  I.,  the 
first  of  the  Valois-Orleans  dynasty,1  waged  an  exterminating  cru- 
sade against  his  heretical  Waldensian  subjects  (see  p.  533).  His 
son  and  successor,  Henry  II.,  also  conceived  it  to  be  his  duty  to 
uproot  heresy ;  and  it  was  his  persecution  of  his  Protestant  sub- 
jects that  sowed  the  seeds  of  those  long  and  woful  civil  and  relig- 
ious wars  which  he  left  as  a  terrible  legacy  to  his  three  feeble  sons, 
Francis,  Charles,  and  Henry,  who  followed  him  in  succession  upon 
the  throne.  At  the  time  these  wars  began,  which  was  about  the 
middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the  confessors  of  the  reformed 
creed,  who  later  were  known  as  Huguenots?  numbered  probably 
400,000.     The  new  dpctrines  found  adherents  especially  among 


1  The  Valois-  Orleans  sovereigns,  whose  reigns  cover  the  greater  part  of 
the  period  treated  in  the  present  chapter,  were  Louis  XII.  (1498-1515),  Fran- 
cis I.  (1515-1547),  Henry  II.  (1547-1559),  Francis  II.  (1559-1560),  Charles 
IX.  (1560-1574),  Henry  III.  (1574-1589).  The  successor  of  Henry  III. — 
Henry  IV.  —  was  the  first  of  the  Bourbons. 

2  This  word  is  probably  a  corruption  of  the  German  Eidgenossen,  meaning 
"  oath-comrades  "  or  "  confederates." 


CATHOLIC  AND  HUGUENOT  LEADERS.  573 

the  nobility  and  the  higher  classes,  and  had  taken  particularly 
deep  root  in  the  South,  —  the  region  of  the  old  Albigensian 
heresy. 

The  Catholic  and  the  Huguenot  Leaders.  —  The  leaders  of  the 
Catholic  party  were  the  notorious  Catherine  de  Medici,  and  the 
powerful  chiefs  of  the  family  of  the  Guises.  Catherine,  the  queen- 
mother  of  the  last  three  Valois-Orleans  sovereigns,  was  an  intrigu- 
ing, treacherous  Italian.  Nominally  she  was  a  Catholic  ;  but  only 
nominally,  for  it  seems  certain  that  she  was  almost  destitute  of 
religious  convictions  of  any  kind.  What  she  sought  was  power, 
and  this  she  was  ready  to  secure  by  any  means.  When  it  suited 
her  purpose,  she  favored  the  Huguenots ;  aud  when  it  suited  her 
purpose  better,  she  incited  the  Catholics  to  make  war  upon  them. 
Perhaps  no  other  woman  ever  made  so  much  trouble  in  the  world. 
She  made  France  wretched  through  the  three  successive  reigns  of 
her  sons,  and  brought  her  house  to  a  shameful  and  miserable  end. 

At  the  head  of  the  family  of  the  Guises  stood  Francis,  Duke  of 
Guise,  a  famous  commander,  who  had  gained  great  credit  and 
popularity  among  his  countrymen  by  many  military  exploits,  espe- 
cially by  his  capture  of  Calais  from  the  English  in  the  recent 
Spanish  wars  (see  p.  553).  By  his  side  stood  a  younger  brother 
Charles,  Cardinal  of  Lorraine.  Both  of  these  men  were  ardent 
Catholics.  Mary  Stuart,  the  queen  of  the  young  king  Francis  II., 
was  their  niece,  and  through  her  they  ruled  the  boy-king.  The 
Pope  and  the  king  of  Spain  were  friends  and  allies  of  the  Guises. 

The  chiefs  of  the  Huguenots  were  the  Bourbon  princes,  Anthony, 
king  of  Navarre,  and  Louis,  Prince  of  Conde",  who,  next  after  the 
brothers  of  Francis  II.,  were  heirs  to  the  French  throne ;  and 
Gaspard  de  Coligny,  Admiral  of  France.  Anthony  was  not  a  man 
of  deep  convictions.  He  at  first  sided  with  the  Protestants,  prob- 
ably because  it  was  only  through  forming  an  alliance  with  them 
that  he  could  carry  on  his  opposition  to  the  Guises.  He  after- 
wards went  over  to  the  side  of  the  Catholics.  A  man  of  very  dif- 
ferent character  was  Admiral  Coligny.  Early  in  life  he  had  em- 
braced the  doctrines  of  the  reformers,  and  he  remained  to  the  last 


574  THE  HUGUENOT   WARS. 

the  trusted  and  consistent,  though  ill-starred,  champion  of  the 
Protestants. 

The  Conspiracy  of  Amboise  (1560).  —  The  foregoing  notice  of 
parties  and  their  chiefs  will  render  intelligible  the  events  which  we 
now  have  to  narrate.  The  harsh  measures  adopted  against  the 
reformers  by  Francis  II.,  who  of  course  was  entirely  under  the 
influence  of  the  Guises,  led  the  chiefs  of  the  persecuted  party  to 
lay  a  plan  for  wresting  the  government  from  the  hands  of  these 
"  new  Mayors  of  the  Palace."  The  Guises  were  to  be  arrested 
and  imprisoned,  and  the  charge  of  the  young  king  given  to  the 
Prince  of  Conde.  The  plot  was  revealed  to  the  Guises,  and  was 
avenged  by  the  execution  of  more  than  a  thousand  of  the  Hugue- 
nots. 

The  Massacre  of  Vassy  (1562).  —  After  the  short  reign  of 
Francis  II.  (1559-1560),  his  brother  Charles  came  to  the  throne 
as  Charles  IX.  He  was  only  ten  years  of  age,  so  the  queen-mother 
assumed  the  government  in  his  name.  Pursuing  her  favorite 
maxim  to  rule  by  setting  one  party  as  a  counterpoise  to  the  other, 
she  gave  the  Bourbon  princes  a  place  in  the  government,  and  also 
by  a  royal  edict  gave  the  Huguenots  a  limited  toleration,  and  for- 
bade their  further  persecution. 

These  concessions  in  favor  of  the  Huguenots  angered  the  Catho- 
lic chiefs,  particularly  the  Guises ;  and  it  was  the  violation  by  the 
adherents  of  the  Duke  of  Guise  of  the  edict  of  toleration  that 
finally  caused  the  growing  animosities  of  the  two  parties  to  break 
out  in  civil  war.  While  passing  through  the  country  with  a  body 
of  armed  attendants,  at  a  small  place  called  Vassy,  the  Duke  came 
upon  a  company  of  Huguenots  assembled  in  a  barn  for  worship. 
His  retainers  first  insulted  and  then  attacked  them,  killing  about 
forty  of  the  company  and  wounding  many  more. 

Under  the  lead  of  Admiral  Coligny  and  the  Prince  of  Cond£, 
the  Huguenots  now  rose  throughout  France.  Philip  II.  of  Spain 
sent  an  army  to  aid  the  Catholics,  while  Elizabeth  of  England  ex- 
tended help  to  the  Huguenots. 

The  Treaty  of  St.  Germain  (1570).  — Throughout  the  series  of 


THE    TREATY  OF  ST.    GERMAIN.  575 

lamentable  civil  wars  l  upon  which  France  now  entered,  both  parties 
displayed  a  ferocity  of  disposition  more  befitting  pagans  than 
Christians.  But  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  many  on  both 
sides  were  actuated  by  political  ambition,  rather  than  by  religious 
conviction,  knowing  little  and  caring  less  about  the  distinctions  in 
the  creeds  for  which  they  were  ostensibly  fighting. 

Sieges,  battles,  and  truces  followed  one  another  in  rapid  and  con- 
fusing succession.  Conspiracies,  treacheries,  and  assassinations 
help  to  fill  up  the  dreary  record  of  the  period.  The  Treaty  of 
St.  Germain  (in  1570)  brought  a  short  but,  as  it  proved,  delusive 
peace.  The  terms  of  the  treaty  were  very  favorable  to  the  Hugue- 
nots. They  received  four  towns,  —  among  which  was  La  Rochelle, 
the  stronghold  of  the  Huguenot  faith,  —  which  they  might  garrison 
and  hold  as  places  of  safety  and  pledges  of  good  faith. 

To  cement  the  treaty,  Catherine  de  Medici  now  proposed  that 
the  Princess  Marguerite,  the  sister  of  Charles  IX.,  should  be  given 
in  marriage  to  Henry  of  Bourbon,  the  new  young  king  of  Navarre. 
The  announcement  of  the  proposed  alliance  caused  great  rejoicing 

1  What  are  usually  designated  as  the  First,  Second,  and  T/tird  Wars  were 
really  one.  The  table  below  exhibits  the  wars  of  the  entire  period  of  which 
we  are  treating.  Some  make  the  Religious  Wars  proper  end  with  the  Edict 
off  Nantes  (1598);  others  with  the  fall  of  La  Rochelle  (1628). 

First  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  Amboise) 1 562-1 563. 

Second  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  Longjumeau) 1 567-1 568. 

Third  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  St.  Germain) 1 568-1 570. 

k re  <>f  St.  Bartholomew's  Day,  Aug.  24 I572- 

Fourth  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  La  Rochelle) 1 572—1 573. 

Fifth  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  Chastenoy) 1 574-1 576. 

Sixth  War  (ended  by  Peace  of  Bergerac) 1577. 

Seventh  War  (ended  by  Treaty  of  Fleix) 1 579-1 580. 

Eighth  War  (War  of  the  Three  Henries) '585-1589. 

Henry  of  Bourbon,  King  of  Navarre,  secures  the  throne      .     .     .   1589. 

Edict  of  Nantes 1598. 

Siege  and  fall  of  La  Rochelle 1627- 1628. 

By  the  fall  of  La  Rochelle  the  political  power  of  the  Huguenots  was  com- 
pletely prostrated. 


576  THE  HUGUENOT   WARS. 

among  Catholics  and  Protestants  alike,  and  the  chiefs  of  both 
parties  crowded  to  Paris  to  attend  the  wedding,  which  took  place 
on  the  1 8th  of  August,  1572. 

The  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew's  Day  (Aug.  24,  1572). — 
Before  the  festivities  which  followed  the  nuptial  ceremonies  were 
over,  the  world  was  shocked  by  one  of  the  most  awful  crimes  of 
which  history  has  to  tell,  —  the  massacre  of  the  Huguenots  in  Paris 
on  St.  Bartholomew's  Day. 

The  circumstances  which  led  to  this  fearful  tragedy  were  as 
follows  :  Among  the  Protestant  nobles  who  came  up  to  Paris  to 
attend  the  wedding  was  the  Admiral  Coligny.  Upon  coming  in 
contact  with  Charles  IX.,  the  Admiral  secured  almost  immediately 
an  entire  ascendency  over  his  mind.  This  influence  Coligny  used 
to  draw  the  king  away  from  the  queen-mother  and  the  Guises. 
Fearing  the  loss  of  her  influence  over  her  son,  Catherine  resolved 
upon  the  death  of  the  Admiral.  The  attempt  miscarried,  Coligny 
receiving  only  a  slight  wound  from  the  assassin's  ball. ' 

The  Huguenots  at  once  rallied  about  their  wounded  chief  with 
loud  threats  of  revenge.  Catherine,  driven  on  by  insane  fear  and 
hatred,  now  determined  upon  the  death  of  all  the  Huguenots  in 
Paris  as  the  only  measure  of  safety.  By  the  23d  of  August,  the 
plans  for  the  massacre  were  all  arranged.  On  the  evening  of  that 
day,  Catherine  went  to  her  son,  and  represented  to  him  that  the 
Huguenots  had  formed  a  plot  for  the  assassination  of  the  royal 
family  and  the  leaders  of  the  Catholic  party,  and  that  the  utter 
ruin  of  their  house  and  cause  could  be  averted  only  by  the  imme- 
diate destruction  of  the  Protestants  within  the  city  walls.  The 
order  for  the  massacre  was  then  laid  before  him  for  his  signature. 
The  king  at  first  refused  to  sign  the  decree,  but,  overcome  at  last 
by  the  representations  of  his  mother,  he  exclaimed,  "  I  agree  to 
the  scheme,  provided  not  one  Huguenot  be  left  alive  in  France  to 
reproach  me  with  the  deed." 

A  little  past  the  hour  of  midnight  on  St.  Bartholomew's  Day 
(Aug.  24,  1572),  at  a  preconcerted  signal,  —  the  tolling  of  a  bell, 
—  the   massacre  began.     Coligny  was  one  of  the  first  victims. 


MASSACfiE   OF  THE  HUGUENOTS.  577 

After  his  assassins  had  done  their  work,  they  tossed  the  body  out 
of  the  window  of  the  chamber  in  which  it  lay,  into  the  street,  in 
order  that  the  Duke  of  Guise,  who  stood  below,  might  satisfy  him- 
self that  his  enemy  was  really  dead.  For  three  days  and  nights 
the  massacre  went  on  within  the  city.  King  Charles  himself  is 
said  to  have  joined  in  the  work,  and  from  one  of  the  windows  of 
the  palace  of  the  Louvre  to  have  fired  upon  the  Huguenots  as 
they  fled  past.  The  number  of  victims  in  Paris  is  variously  esti- 
mated at  from  3,000  to  10,000. 

With  the  capital  cleared  of  Huguenots,  orders  were  issued  to 
the  principal  cities  of  France  to  purge  themselves  in  like  manner 
of  heretics.  In  many  places  the  instincts  of  humanity  prevailed 
over  fear  of  the  royal  resentment,  and  the  decree  was  disobeyed. 
But  in  other  places  the  orders  were  carried  out,  and  frightful  mas- 
sacres took  place.  The  entire  number  of  victims  throughout  the 
country  was  probably  between  20,000  and  30,000. 

The  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew's  Day  raised  a  cry  of  execra- 
tion in  almost  every  part  of  the  civilized  world,  among  Catholics 
and  Protestants  alike.  Philip  II.,  however,  is  said  to  have  received 
the  news  with  unfeigned  joy ;  while  Pope  Gregory  XIII.  caused 
a  Te  Detim,  in  commemoration  of  the  event,  to  be  sung  in  the 
church  of  St.  Mark,  in  Rome.  Respecting  this  it  should  in  jus- 
tice be  said  that  Catholic  writers  maintain  that  the  Pope  acted 
under  a  misconception  of  the  facts,  it  having  been  represented 
to  him  that  the  massacre  resulted  from  a  thwarted  plot  of  the 
Huguenots  against  the  royal  family  of  France  and  the  Catholic 
Church. 

Reign  of  Henry  III.  (15 74-1589).  —The  massacre  of  St.  Bar- 
tholomew's Day,  instead  of  exterminating  heresy  in  France,  only 
served  to  rouse  the  Huguenots  to  a  more  determined  defence 
of  their  faith.  Throughout  the  last  two  years  of  the  reign  of 
Charles  IX.,  and  the  fifteen  succeeding  years  of  the  reign  of  his 
brother  Henry  III.,  the  country  was  in  a  state  of  turmoil  and  war. 
At  length  the  king,  who,  jealous  of  the  growing  power  and  popu- 
larity of  the  Duke  of  Guise,  had  caused  him  to  be  assassinated, 


578  THE  HUGUENOT    WARS. 

was  himself  struck  down  by  the  avenging  dagger  of  a  Dominican 
monk.     With  him  ended  the  House  of  Valois-Orleans. 

Henry  of  Bourbon,  king  of  Navarre,  who  for  many  years  had 
been  the  most  prominent  leader  of  the  Huguenots,  now  came  to 
the  throne  as  the  first  of  the  Bourbon  kings. 

Accession  of  Henry  IV.  (1589).  —  Notwithstanding  that  the 
doctrines  of  the  reformers  had  made  rapid  progress  in  France 
under  the  sons  of  Henry  II.,  still  the  majority  of  the  nation  at  the 
time  of  the  death  of  Henry  III.  were  Roman  Catholics  in  faith 
and  worship.  Under  these  circumstances,  we  shall  hardly  expect 
to  find  the  entire  nation  quietly  acquiescing  in  the  accession  to 
the  French  throne  of  a  Protestant  prince,  and  he  the  leader  and 
champion  of  the  hated  Huguenots.  Nor  did  Henry  secure  without 
a  struggle  the  crown  that  was  his  by  right.  The  Catholics  declared 
for  Cardinal  Bourbon,  an  uncle  of  the  king  of  Navarre,  and  France 
was  thus  kept  in  the  whirl  of  civil  war.  Elizabeth  of  England 
aided  the  Protestants,  and  Philip  II.  of  Spain  assisted  the 
Catholics. 

Henry  tnrns  Catholic  (1593).  —  After  the  war  had  gone  on 
for  about  four  years,  —  during  which  time  was  fought  the  noted 
battle  of  Ivry,  in  which  Henry  led  his  soldiers  to  victory  by  tell- 
ing them  to  follow  the  white  plume  on  his  hat,  —  the  quarrel  was 
closed,  for  the  time  being,  by  Henry's  abjuration  of  the  Huguenot 
faith,  and  his  adoption  of  that  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 

(i593)- 

Mingled  motives  led  Henry  to  do  this.  He  was  personally 
liked  even  by  the  Catholic  chiefs,  and  he  was  well  aware  that  it 
was  only  his  Huguenot  faith  that  prevented  their  being  his  hearty 
supporters.  Hence  duty  and  policy  seemed  to  him  to  concur  in 
urging  him  to  remove  the  sole  obstacle  in  the  way  of  their  ready 
loyalty,  and  thus  bring  peace  and  quiet  to  distracted  France. 

The  Edict  of  Nantes  (1598).  — As  soon  as  Henry  had  become 
the  crowned  and  acknowledged  king  of  France,  he  gave  himself 
to  the  work  of  composing  the  affairs  of  his  kingdom.  The  most 
noteworthy  of  the  measures  he  adopted  to  this  end  was  the  publi- 


CARDINAL  RICHELIEU. 


579 


cation  of  the  celebrated  Edict  of  Nantes  (April  15,  1598).  This 
decree  granted  the  Huguenots  practical  freedom  of  worship, 
opened  to  them  all  offices  and  employments,  and  gave  them  as 
places  of  refuge  and  defence  a  large  number  of  fortified  towns, 
among  which  was  the  important  city  of  La  Rochelle. 

The  temporary  hushing  of  the  long-continued  quarrels  of  the 
Catholics  and  Protestants  by  the  adoption  of  the  principle  of 
religious  toleration,  paved  the  way  for  a  revival  of  the  trade  and 
industries  of  the  country,  which  had  been  almost  destroyed  by 
the  anarchy  and  waste  of  the  civil  wars.  France  now  entered  upon 
such  a  period  of  prosperity  as  she  had  not  known  for  many  years. 

Louis  XIII.  and  his  Minister,  Cardinal  Richelieu.  —  Henry 
IV.  was  assassinated  by  a  fanatic 
named  Ravaillac,  who  regarded  him  as 
an  enemy  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  As  his  son  Louis,  who  suc- 
ceeded him  as  Louis  XIII.  (1610- 
1643),  was  a  child  of  nine  years, 
during  his  minority  the  govern- 
ment was  administered  by  his  mother, 
Mary  de  Medici.  Upon  attaining 
his  majority,  Louis  took  the  govern- 
ment into  his  own  hands.  He  chose, 
as  his  chief  minister,  Cardinal  Riche- 
lieu, one  of  the  most  remarkable  char- 
acters of  the  seventeenth  century. 
From  the  time  that  Louis  admitted 
the  young  prelate  to  his  cabinet  (in 
1622),  the  ecclesiastic  became  the  virtual  sovereign  of  France, 
and  for  the  space  of  twenty  years  swayed  the  destinies  not  only 
of  that  country,  but,  it  might  almost  be  said,  those  of  Europe  as 
well. 

Richelieu's  policy  was  twofold  :  first,  to  render  the  authority  of 
the  French  king  absolute  in  France ;  secondly,  to  make  the  power 
of  France  supreme  in  Europe. 


CARDINAL    RICHELIEU. 
(After  a  painting  in  the   Louvre.) 


580  THE  HUGUENOT    WARS. 

To  attain  the  first  end,  Richelieu  sought  to  crush  the  political 
power  of  the  Huguenots,  and  to  trample  out  the  last  vestige  of 
independence  among  the  old  feudal  aristocracy;  to  secure  the 
second,  he  labored  to  break  down  the  power  of  both  branches  of 
the  House  of  Hapsburg,  —  that  is,  of  Austria  and  Spain. 

For  nearly  the  life- time  of  a  generation  Richelieu,  by  intrigue, 
diplomacy,  and  war,  pursued  with  unrelenting  purpose  these  ob- 
jects of  his  ambition.  His  own  words  best  indicate  how  he  pro- 
posed to  use  his  double  authority  as  cardinal  and  prime  minister 
to  effect  his  purpose  :  "  I  shall  trample  all  opposition  under  foot," 
said  he,  "and  then  cover  all  errors  with  my  scarlet  robe." 

In  the  following  paragraph  we  shall  speak  very  briefly  of  the 
cardinal's  dealings  with  the  Huguenots,  which  feature  alone  of  his 
policy  especially  concerns  us  at  present. 

Political  Power  of  the  Huguenots  crushed.  —  In  the  prosecu- 
tion of  his  plans,  Cardinal  Richelieu's  first  step  was  to  break  down 
the  political  power  of  the  Huguenot  chiefs,  who,  dissatisfied  with 
their  position  in  the  government,  and  irritated  by  religious  griev- 
ances, were  revolving  in  mind  the  founding  in  France  of  a  Protes- 
tant commonwealth  like  that  which  the  Prince  of  Orange  and  his 
adherents  had  set  up  in  the  Netherlands.  The  capital  of  the  new 
Republic  was  to  be  La  Rochelle,  on  the  southwestern  coast  of 
France.  In  1627,  an  alliance  having  been  formed  between  Eng- 
land and  the  French  Protestant  nobles,  an  English  fleet  and  army 
were  sent  across  the  Channel  to  aid  the  Huguenot  enterprise. 

Richelieu  now  resolved  to  ruin  forever  the  power  of  these 
Protestant  nobles  who  were  constantly  challenging  the  royal 
authority  and  threatening  the  dismemberment  of  France.  Ac- 
cordingly he  led  in  person  an  army  to  the  siege  of  La  Rochelle, 
which,  after  a  gallant  resistance  of  more  than  a  year,  was  compelled 
to  open  its  gates  to  the  cardinal  (1628).  That  the  place  might 
never  again  be  made  the  centre  of  resistance  to  the  royal  power, 
Louis  ordered  that  "  the  fortifications  be  razed  to  the  ground,  in 
such  wise  that  the  plough  may  plough  through  the  soil  as  through 
tilled  land." 


THE  EDICT   OF  GRACE.  581 

The  Huguenots  maintained  the  struggle  a  few  months  longer  in 
the  south  of  France,  but  were  finally  everywhere  reduced  to  sub- 
mission. The  result  of  the  war  was  the  complete  destruction  of 
the  political  power  of  the  French  Protestants.  A  treaty  of  peace, 
called  the  Edict  of  Grace,  negotiated  the  year  after  the  fall  of  La 
Rochelle,  left  them,  however,  freedom  of  worship,  according  to  the 
provisions  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  (see  p.  578). 

The  Edict  of  Grace  properly  marks  the  close  of  the  religious 
wars  which  had  desolated  France  for  two  generations  (from  1562 
to  1629).  It  is  estimated  that  this  series  of  wars  and  massacres 
cost  France  a  million  lives,  and  that  between  three  and  four 
hundred  hamlets  and  towns  were  destroyed  by  the  contending 
parties. 

Richelieu  and  the  Thirty  Years'  War.  —  When  Cardinal 
Richelieu  came  to  the  head  of  affairs  in  France,  there  was  going 
on  in  Germany  the  Thirty  Years'  War  (1618-1648),  of  which  we 
shall  tell  in  the  following  chapter.  This  was  very  much  such  a 
struggle  between  the  Catholic  and  Protestant  German  princes  as 
we  have  seen  waged  between  the  two  religious  parties  in  France. 

Although  Richelieu  had  just  crushed  French  Protestantism,  he 
now  gives  aid  to  the  Protestant  princes  of  Germany,  because  their 
success  meant  the  division  of  Germany  and  the  humiliation  of 
Austria.  Richelieu  did  not  live  to  see  the  end  either  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  or  of  that  which  he  had  begun  with  Spain ;  but  this 
foreign  policy  of  the  great  minister,  carried  out  by  others,  finally 
resulted,  as  we  shall  learn  hereafter,  in  the  humiliation  of  both 
branches  of  the  House  of  Hapsburg,  and  the  lifting  of  France  to 
the  first  place  among  the  powers  of  Europe. 


582  THE    THIRTY   YEARS'    WAR. 

CHAPTER    LIII. 

THE  THIRTY  YEARS'  WAR. 

(1618-1648.) 

Nature  and  Causes  of  the  War.  —  The  long  and  calamitous 
Thirty  Years'  War  was  the  last  great  combat  between  Protestant- 
ism and  Catholicism  in  Europe.  It  started  as  a  struggle  between 
the  Protestant  and  Catholic  princes  of  Germany,  but  gradually 
involved  almost  all  the  states  of  the  continent,  degenerating  at 
last  into  a  shameful  and  heartless  struggle  for  power  and  territory. 

The  real  cause  of  the  war  was  the  enmity  existing  between  the 
German  Protestants  and  Catholics.  Each  party  by  its  encroach- 
ments gave  the  other  occasion  for  complaint.  The  Protestants 
at  length  formed  for  their  mutual  protection  a  league  called 
the  Evangelical  Union  (1608).  In  opposition  to  the  Union,  the 
Catholics  formed  a  confederation  known  as  the  Holy  League 
(1609).  All  Germany  was  thus  prepared  to  burst  into  the  flames 
of  a  religious  war. 

The  Bohemian  Period  of  the  War  (161 8- 1623).  —  The  flames 
that  were  to  desolate  Germany  for  a  generation  were  first  kindled  in 
Bohemia,  where  were  still  smouldering  embers  of  the  Hussite  wars, 
which  two  centuries  before  had  desolated  that  land  (see  p.  505). 
A  church  which  the  Protestants  maintained  they  had  a  right  to 
build  was  torn  down  by  the  Catholics,  and  another  was  closed. 
The  Protestants  rose  in  revolt  against  their  Catholic  king,  Ferdi- 
nand, elected  a  new  Protestant  king,1  and  drove  out  the  Jesuits. 
The  Thirty  Years'  War  had  begun  (1618).  Almost  an  exact 
century  had  passed  since  Luther  posted  his  theses  on  the  door 
of  the  court  church  at  Wittenberg.  It  is  estimated  that  at  this 
time  more  than  nine-tenths  of  the  population  of  the  empire  were 
Protestants. 

1  Frederick  V.  of  the  Palatinate,  son-in-law  of  James  I.  of  England. 


THE  DANISH  PERIOD.  583 

The  war  had  scarcely  opened  when,  the  Imperial  office  falling 
vacant,  the  Bohemian  king,  Ferdinand,  was  elected  emperor.  With 
the  power  and  influence  he  now  wielded,  it  was  not  a  difficult 
matter  for  him  to  quell  the  Protestant  insurrection  in  his  royal 
dominions.  The  leaders  of  the  revolt  were  executed,  and  the 
reformed  faith  in  Bohemia  was  almost  uprooted. 

The  Danish  Period  (1625-1629).  —  The  situation  of  affairs  at 
this  moment  in  Germany  filled  all  the  Protestant  rulers  of  the 
North  with  the  greatest  alarm.  Christian  IV.,  king  of  Denmark, 
supported  by  England  and  Holland,  threw  himself  into  the  strug- 
gle as  the  champion  of  German  Protestantism.  He  now  becomes 
the  central  figure  on  the  side  of  the  reformers.  On  the  side  of  the 
Catholics  are  two  noted  commanders,  —  Tilly,  the  leader  of  the 
forces  of  the  Holy  League,  and  Wallenstein,  the  commander  of 
the  Imperial  army.  What  is  known  as  the  Danish  period  of  the 
war  now  begins  (1625). 

The  war,  in  the  main,  proved  disastrous  to  the  Protestant  allies, 
and  Christian  IV.  was  constrained  to  conclude  a  treaty  of  peace 
with  the  emperor  (Peace  of  Liibeck,  1629),  and  retire  from  the 
struggle. 

By  what  is  known  as  the  Edict  of  Restitution  (1629),  the  Em- 
peror Ferdinand  now  restored  to  the  Catholics  all  the  ecclesiasti- 
cal lands  and  offices  in  North  Germany  of  which  possession  had 
been  taken  by  the  Protestants  in  violation  of  the  terms  of  the 
Peace  of  Augsburg.  This  decree  gave  back  to  the  Catholic 
Church  two  archbishoprics,  twelve  bishoprics,  besides  many  mon- 
asteries and  other  ecclesiastical  property. 

The  Swedish  Period  (1 630-1 635)  ;  Gustavus  Adolphus,  Wal- 
lenstein, and  Tilly.  —  At  this  moment  of  seeming  triumph,  Ferdi- 
nand was  constrained  by  rising  discontent  and  jealousies  to  dismiss 
from  his  service  his  most  efficient  general,  Wallenstein,  who  had 
made  almost  all  classes,  save  his  soldiers,  his  bitter  enemies.  In 
his  retirement,  Wallenstein  maintained  a  court  of  fabulous  magnifi- 
cence. Wherever  he  went  he  was  followed  by  an  imperial  train 
of  attendants  and  equipages.     He  was  reserved  and  silent,  but 


584  THE    THIRTY   YEARS'    WAR. 

his  eye  was  upon  everything  going  on  in  Germany,  and  indeed  in 
Europe.  He  was  watching  for  a  favorable  moment  for  revenge, 
and  the  retrieving  of  his  fortunes. 

The  opportunity  which  Wallenstein,  inspired  by  faith  in  his  star, 
was  so  confidently  awaiting  was  not  long  delayed.  Only  a  few 
months  before  his  dismissal  from  the  Imperial  ^service,  Gustavus 
Adolphus,  king  of  Sweden,  with  a  veteran  and  enthusiastic  army 
of  16,000  Swedes,  had  appeared  in  Northern  Germany  as  the  cham- 
pion of  the  dispirited  and  leaderless  Protestants.  The  Protestant 
princes,  however,  through  fear  of  the  emperor,  as  well  as  from 
lack  of  confidence  in  the  disinterestedness  of  the  motives  of 
Gustavus,  were  shamefully  backward  in  rallying  to  the  support  of 
their  deliverer.  But  through  an  alliance  formed  just  now  with 
France,  the  Swedish  king  received  a  large  annual  subsidy  from 
that  country,  which,  with  the  help  he  was  receiving  from  England, 
made  him  a  formidable  antagonist. 

The  wavering,  jealous,  and  unworthy  conduct  of  the  Protestant 
princes  now  led  to  a  most  terrible  disaster.  At  this  moment  Tilly 
was  besieging  the  city  of  Magdeburg,  which  had  dared  to  resist  the 
Edict  of  Restitution  (see  p.  583).  Gustavus  was  prevented  from 
giving  relief  to  the  place  by  the  hindrances  thrown  in  his  way  by 
the  Electors  of  Brandenburg  and  Saxony,  both  of  whom  should 
have  given  him  every  assistance.  In  a  short  time  the  city  was 
obliged  to  surrender,  and  was  given  up  to  sack  and  pillage. 
Everything  was  burned,  save  two  churches  and  a  few  hovels. 
30,000  of  the  inhabitants  perished  miserably. 

The  cruel  fate  of  Magdeburg  excited  the  alarm  of  the  Protestant 
princes.  The  Elector  of  Saxony  now  at  once  united  his  forces 
with  those  of  the  Swedish  king.  Tilly  was  defeated  with  great 
loss  in  the  celebrated  battle  of  Leipsic  (1631),  and  Gustavus, 
emboldened  by  his  success,  pushed  southward  into  the  very  heart 
of  Germany.  Attempting  to  dispute  his  march,  Tilly's  army 
was  again  defeated,  and  he  himself  received  a  fatal  wound.  In 
the  death  of  Tilly,  Ferdinand  lost  his  most  trustworthy  general 
(1632). 


THE   SWEDISH  PERIOD. 


585 


The  Imperial  cause  appeared  desperate.  There  was  but  one  man 
in  Germany  who  could  turn  the  tide  of  victory  that  was  running  so 
strongly  in  ta- 
vor  of  the  Swe- 
dish monarch. 
That  man  was 
Wallenstein  ; 
and  to  him 
the  emperor 
now  turned. 
This  strange 
man  had  been 
watching  with 
secret  satis- 
faction the 
success  of  the 
Swedish  arms, 
and  had  even 
offered  to  Gus- 
tavus  his  aid, 
promising  "to 
chase  the  emperor  and  the  House  of  Austria   over  the   Alps." 

To  this  proud  subject  of  his,  fresh  from  his  dalliances  with  his 
enemies,  the  emperor  now  appealed  for  help.  Wallenstein  agreed 
to  raise  an  army,  provided  his  control  of  it  should  be  absolute. 
Ferdinand  was  constrained  to  grant  all  that  his  old  general  de- 
manded. Wallenstein  now  raised  his  standard,  to  which  rallied 
the  adventurers  not  only  of  Germany,  but  of  all  Europe  as  well. 
The  array  was  a  vast  and  heterogeneous  host,  bound  together  by 
no  bonds  of  patriotism,  loyalty,  or  convictions,  but  by  the  spell 
and  prestige  of  the  name  of  Wallenstein. 

With  an  army  of  40,000  men  obedient  to  his  commands, 
Wallenstein,  after  numerous  marches  and  counter-marches,  at- 
tacked the  Swedes  in  a  terrible  battle  on  the  memorable  field  of 
Ltitzen,  in  Saxony.  The  Swedes  won  the  day,  but  lost  their  leader 
and  sovereign  (1632). 


DEATH  OF  GUSTAVUS  ADOLPHUS  AT  THE  BATTLE  OF 
LUTZEN. 


586  THE    THIRTY    YEARS'    WAR. 

Notwithstanding  the  death  of  their  great  king  and  commander, 
the  Swedes  did  not  withdraw  from  the  war.  Hence  the  struggle 
went  on,  the  advantage  being  for  the  most  part  with  the  Protes- 
tant allies.  Ferdinand,  at  just  this  time,  was  embarrassed  by  the 
suspicious  movements  of  his  general  Wallenstein.  Becoming  con- 
vinced that  he  was  meditating  the  betrayal  of  the  Imperial  cause, 
the  emperor  caused  him  to  be  assassinated  (1634).  This  event 
marks  very  nearly  the  end  of  the  Swedish  period  of  the  war. 

The  Swedish-French  Period  (1635-1648).  —  Had  it  not  been 
for  the  selfish  and  ambitious  interference  of  France,  the  woeful 
war  which  had  now  desolated  Germany  for  half  a  century  might 
here  have  come  to  an  end,  for  both  sides  were  weary  of  it  and 
ready  for  negotiations  of  peace.  But  Richelieu  was  not  willing 
that  the  war  should  end  until  the  House  of  Austria  was  thoroughly 
crippled.  Accordingly  he  encouraged  Oxenstiern,  the  Swedish 
chancellor,  to  persevere  in  carrying  on  the  war,  promising  him  the 
aid  of  the  French  armies. 

The  war  thus  lost  in  large  part  its  original  character  of  a  contest 
between  the  Catholic  and  the  Protestant  princes  of  Germany, 
and  became  a  political  struggle  between  the  House  of  Austria  and 
the  House  of  Bourbon,  in  which  the  former  was  fighting  for  exist- 
ence, the  latter  for  national  aggrandizement. 

The  Treaty  of  Westphalia  (1648).  —  And  so  the  miserable  war 
dragged  ofi.  The  earlier  actors  in  the  drama  at  length  passed 
from  the  scene,  but  their  parts  were  carried  on  by  others.  The 
year  1643,  which  marks  the  death  of  Richelieu,  heard  the  first 
whisperings  of  peace.  Everybody  was  inexpressibly  weary  of  the 
war,  and  longed  for  the  cessation  of  its  horrors,  yet  each  one 
wanted  peace  on  terms  advantageous  to  himself.  The  arrange- 
ment of  the  articles  of  peace  was  a  matter  of  immense  difficulty ; 
for  the  affairs  and  boundaries  of  the  states  of  Central  Europe  were 
in  almost  hopeless  confusion.  After  five  years  of  memorable  dis- 
cussion and  negotiation,  the  articles  of  the  celebrated  Treaty  of 
Westphalia,  as  it  was  called,  were  signed  by  the  different  European 
powers. 


THE    TREATY  OF   WESTPHALIA.  587 

The  chief  articles  of  this  important  treaty  may  be  made  to  fall 
under  two  heads  :  ( i )  those  relating  to  territorial  boundaries,  and 
(2)  those  respecting  religion. 

As  to  the  first,  these  cut  short  in  three  directions  the  actual  or 
nominal  limits  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire.  Switzerland  and  the 
tinted  Netherlands  were  severed  from  it ;  for  though  both  of  these 
countries  had  been  for  a  long  time  practically  independent  of  the 
empire,  this  independence  had  never  been  acknowledged  in  any 
formal  way.  The  claim  of  France  to  the  three  cities  of  Metz, 
Toul,  and  Verdun  in  Lorraine,  which  places  she  had  held  for 
about  a  century,  was  confirmed,  and  a  great  part  of  Alsace  was 
given  to  her.  Thus  on  the  west,  on  the  southwest,  and  on  the 
northwest,  the  empire  suffered  loss. 

Sweden  was  given  cities  and  territories  in  Northern  Germany 
which  gave  her  control  of  a  long  strip  of  the  Baltic  shore,  a  most 
valuable  possession.  But  these  lands  were  not  given  to  the  Swed- 
ish king  in  full  sovereignty ;  they  still  remained  a  part  of  the  Ger- 
manic body,  and  the  king  of  Sweden  as  to  them  became  a  prince 
of  the  empire. 

The  changes  within  the  empire  were  many,  and  some  of  them 
important.  Brandenburg  especially  received  considerable  addi- 
tions of  territory. 

The  articles  respecting  religion  were  even  more  important  than 
those  which  established  the  metes  and  bounds  of  the  different 
states.  Catholics,  Lutherans,  and  Calvinists  were  all  put  upon  the 
same  footing.  The  Protestants  were  to  retain  all  the  benefices 
and  Church  property  of  which  they  had  possession  in  1624. 
Every  prince  was  to  have  the  right  to  make  his  religion  the  religion 
of  his  people,  and  to  banish  all  who  refused  to  adopt  the  estab- 
lished creed  :  but  such  non-conformists  were  to  have  three  years 
in  which  to  emigrate. 

The  different  states  of  the  empire  were  left  almost  independent 
of  the  emperor.  They  were  given  the  right  to  form  alliances  with 
one  another  and  with  foreign  princes  ;  but  not,  of  course,  against 
the  empire  or  emperor.    This  provision  made  Germany  nothing 


588  THE    THIRTY   YEARS'    WAR. 

more  than  a  lax  confederation,  and  postponed  to  a  distant  future 
the  nationalization  of  the  German  states. 

Effects  of  the  War  upon  Germany.  —  It  is  simply  impossible 
to  picture  the  wretched  condition  in  which  the  Thirty  Years'  War 
left  Germany.  When  the  struggle  began,  the  population  of  the 
country  was  30,000,000 ;  when  it  ended,  1 2,000,000.  Many  of 
the  once  large  and  flourishing  cities  were  reduced  to  "  mere  shells." 
Two  or  three  hundred  ill-clad  persons  constituted  the  population 
of  Berlin.  The  duchy  of  Wurtemburg,  which  had  half  a  million 
of  inhabitants  at  the  commencement  of  the  war,  at  its  close  had 
barely  50,000.  On  every  hand  were  the  charred  remains  of  the 
hovels  of  the  peasants  and  the  palaces  of  the  nobility.  The  lines 
of  commerce  were  broken,  and  some  trades  and  industries  were 
swept  quite  out  of  existence. 

The  effects  upon  the  fine  arts,  upon  science,  learning,  and 
morals  were  even  more  lamentable.  Painting,  sculpture,  and 
architecture  were  driven  out  of  the  land.  The  cities  which  had 
been  the  home  of  all  these  arts  lay  in  ruins.  Education  was  en- 
tirely neglected.  For  the  lifetime  of  a  generation,  men  had  been 
engaged  in  the  business  of  war,  and  had  allowed  their  children  to 
grow  up  in  absolute  ignorance.  Moral  law  was  forgotten.  Vice, 
nourished  by  the  licentious  atmosphere  of  the  camp,  reigned 
supreme.  "  In  character,  in  intelligence,  and  in  morality,  the 
German  people  were  set  back  two  hundred  years." 

To  all  these  evils  were  added  those  of  political  disunion  and 
weakness.  The  title  of  emperor  still  continued  to  be  borne  by 
a  member  of  the  House  of  Austria,  but  it  was  only  an  empty  name. 
By  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  the  Germanic  body  lost  even  that 
little  cohesion  which  had  begun  to  manifest  itself  between  its 
different  parts,  and  became  simply  a  loose  assemblage  of  virtually 
independent  states,  of  which  there  were  now  over  two  hundred. 
Thus  weakened,  Germany  lost  her  independence  as  a  nation,  while 
the  subjects  of  the  numerous  petty  states  became  the  slaves  of 
their  ambitious  and  tyrannical  rulers.  Worse  than  all,  the  over- 
whelming calamities  that  for  the  lifetime  of  a  generation  had  been 


CONCLUSION.  589 

poured  out  upon  the  unfortunate  land,  had  extinguished  the  last 
spark  of  German  patriotism.  Every  sentiment  of  pride  and  hope 
in  race  and  country  seemed  to  have  become  extinct. 

Conclusion.  —  The  treaty  of  Westphalia  is  a  prominent  land- 
mark in  universal  history.  It  stands  at  the  dividing  line  of  two 
great  epochs.  It  marks  the  end  of  the  Reformation  Era  and  the 
beginning  of  that  of  the  Political  Revolution.  Henceforth  men 
will  fight  for  constitutions,  not  creeds.  We  shall  not  often  see 
one  nation  attacking  another,  or  one  party  in  a  nation  assaulting 
another  party,  on  account  of  a  difference  in  religious  opinion.1 

But  in  setting  the  Peace  of  Westphalia  to  mark  the  end  of  the 
religious  wars  occasioned  by  the  Reformation,  we  do  not  mean  to 
convey  the  idea  that  men  had  come  to  embrace  the  beneficent 
doctrine  of  religious  toleration.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  no  real  tolera- 
tion had  yet  been  reached  —  nothing  save  the  semblance  of  tolera- 
tion. The  long  conflict  of  a  century  and  more,  and  the  vicissitudes 
of  fortune,  which  to-day  gave  one  party  the  power  of  the  persecutor 
and  to-morrow  made  the  same  sect  the  victims  of  persecution,  had 
simply  forced  all  to  the  practical  conclusion  that  they  must  tolerate 
one  another,  —  that  one  sect  must  not  attempt  to  put  another 
down  by  force.  But  it  required  the  broadening  and  liberalizing 
lessons  of  another  full  century  to  bring  men  to  see  that  the  thing 
they  must  do  is  the  very  thing  they  ought  to  do,  —  to  make  men 
tolerant  not  only  in  outward  conduct,  but  in  spirit. 

With  this  single  word  of  caution,  we  now  pass  to  the  study  of 
the  Era  of  the  Political  Revolution,  the  period  marked  by  the 
struggle  between  despotic  and  liberal  principles  of  government. 
And  first,  we  shall  give  a  sketch  of  absolute  monarchy  as  it  ex- 
hibited itself  in  France  under  the  autocrat  Louis  XIV. 

1  The  Puritan  Revolution  in  England  may  look  like  a  religious  war,  but  we 
shall  learn  that  it  was  primarily  a  political  contest,  —  a  Struggle  against  des- 
potism in  the  state. 


SECOND  PERIOD.  — THE  ERA  OF  THE  POLITICAL 
REVOLUTION. 

(FROM  THE  PEACE  Or  WESTPHALIA  IN  1648  TO  THE  PRESENT  TIME.) 


CHAPTER    LIV. 

THE  ASCENDENCY  OF    FRANCE  UNDER  THE  ABSOLUTE 
GOVERNMENT    OF    LOUIS    XIV. 

(1643-1715.) 

The  Divine  Right  of  Kings.  — Louis  XIV.  stands  as  the  repre- 
sentative of  absolute  monarchy.  This  indeed  was  no  new  thing  in 
the  world,  but  Louis  was  such  an  ideal  autocrat  that  somehow  he 
made  autocratic  government  strangely  attractive.  Other  kings 
imitated  him,  and  it  became  the  prevailing  theory  of  government 
that  kings  have  a  "  divine  right "  to  rule,  and  that  the  people 
should  have  no  part  at  all  in  government. 

According  to  this  theory,  the  nation  is  a  great  family  with  the 
king  as  its  divinely  appointed  head.  The  duty  of  the  king  is  to 
govern  like  a  father ;  the  duty  of  the  people  is  to  obey  their  king 
even  as  children  obey  their  parents.  If  the  king  does  wrong,  is 
harsh,  cruel,  unjust,  this  is  simply  the  misfortune  of  his  people  : 
under  no  circumstances  is  it  right  for  them  to  rebel  against  his 
authority,  any  more  than  for  children  to  rise  against  their  father. 
The  king  is  responsible  to  God  alone,  and  to  God  the  people, 
quietly  submissive,  must  leave  the  avenging  of  all  their  wrongs. 

Before  the  close  of  the  period  upon  which  we  here  enter,  we 
shall  see  how  this  theory  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  worked  out 
in  practice,  —  how  dear  it  cost  both  kings  and  people,  and  how 
the   people   by  the  strong  logic  of  revolution  demonstrated  that 


BASIS   OF   THE  POWER    OF  LOUTS  XTV.  591 

they  are  not  children  but  mature  men,  and  have  a  divine  and 
inalienable  right  to  govern  themselves. 

The  Basis  of  Louis  XIV.'s  Power.  —  The  basis  of  the  abso- 
lute power  of  Louis  XIV.  was  laid  by  Cardinal  Richelieu  during 
the  reign  of  Louis  XIII.  (see  p.  580).  Besides  crushing  the 
political  power  of  the  Huguenots,  and  thereby  vastly  augmenting 
the  security  and  strength  of  the  royal  authority,  the  Cardinal  suc- 
ceeded, by  various  means,  —  by  annulling  their  privileges,  by  ban- 
ishment, confiscations,  and  executions,  —  in  almost  extinguishing 
the  expiring  independence  of  the  old  feudal  aristocracy,  and  in 
forcing  the  once  haughty  and  refractory  nobles  to  yield  humble 
obedience  to  the  crown. 

In  1643,  barely  six  months  after  the  death  of  his  great  minister, 
Louis  XIII.  died,  leaving  the  vast  power  which  the  Cardinal  had 
done  so  much  to  consolidate,  as  an  inheritance  to  his  little  son,  a 
child  of  five  years. 

The  Administration  of  Mazarin. —  During  the  minority  of 
Louis  the  government  was  in  the  hands  of  his  mother,  Anne  of 
Austria,  as  regent.  She  chose  as  her  prime  minister  an  Italian 
ecclesiastic,  Cardinal  Mazarin,  who,  in  his  administration  of  affairs, 
followed  in  the  footsteps  of  his  predecessor,  Richelieu,  carrying 
out  with  great  ability  the  comprehensive  policy  of  that  minister. 
France  was  encouraged  to  maintain  her  part  —  and  a  very  glorious 
part  it  was,  as  war  goes  —  in  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  until  Austria 
was  completely  exhausted,  and  all  Germany  indeed  almost  ruined. 
Even  after  the  Peace  of  Westphalia,  which  simply  concluded  the 
war  in  Germany,  France  carried  on  the  war  with  Spain  for  ten 
years  longer,  until  1659,  when  the  Treaty  of  the  Pyrenees,  which 
gave  the  French  the  two  provinces  of  Artois  and  Roussillon, 
asserted  the  triumph  of  France  over  Spain.  Richelieu's  plan  had 
at  last,  though  at  terrible  cost  to  France1  and  all  Europe,  been 

1  The  heavy  taxes  laid  to  meet  the  expenses  of  the  wars  created  great  dis- 
content, which  during  the  struggle  with  Spain  led  to  a  series  of  conspiracies 
or  revolts  against  the  government,  known  as  the  Wars  of  the  Fronde  (1648- 
1652).     "Notwithstanding  its  peculiar  character  of  levity  and  burlesque,  the 


592  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

crowned  with  success.  The  House  of  Austria  in  both  its  branches 
had  been  humiliated  and  crippled,  and  the  House  of  Bourbon  was 
ready  to  assume  the  lead  in  European  affairs. 

Louis  XIV.  assumes  the  Government.  —  Cardinal  Mazarin  died 
in  1 66 1.  Upon  this  event,  Louis,  who  was  now  twenty-three  years 
of  age,  became  his  own  prime  minister,  and  for  more  than  half  a 
century  thereafter  ruled  France  as  an  absolute  and  irresponsible 
monarch.  He  regarded  France  as  his  private  estate,  and  seemed 
to  be  fully  convinced  that  he  had  a  divine  commission  to  govern 
the  French  people.  It  is  said  that  he  declared,  UEtat,  c'est  mot, 
"I  am  the  State,"  meaning  that  he  alone  was  the  rightful  legislator, 
judge,  and  executive  of  the  French  nation.  The  States-General 
was  not  once  convened  during  his  long  reign.  Richelieu  made 
Louis  XIII.  "  the  first  man  in  Europe,  but  the  second  in  his  own 
kingdom."  Louis  XIV.  was  the  first  man  at  home  as  well  as 
abroad.  He  had  able  men  about  him  ;  but  they  served  instead  of 
ruling  him. 

Colbert.  —  Mazarin  when  dying  said  to  Louis,  "  Sire,  I  owe 
everything  to  you ;  but  I  pay  my  debt  to  your  majesty  by  giving 
you  Colbert."  During  the  first  ten  or  twelve  years  of  Louis's  per- 
sonal reign,  this  extraordinary  man  inspired  and  directed  every- 
thing ;  but  he  carefully  avoided  the  appearance  of  doing  so.  His 
maxim  seemed  to  be,  Mine  the  labor,  thine  the  praise.  He  did 
for  the  domestic  affairs  of  France  what  Richelieu  had  done  for  the 
foreign.  So  long  as  Louis  followed  the  policy  of  Colbert,  he  gave 
France  a  truly  glorious  reign ;  but  unfortunately  he  soon  turned 
aside  from  the  great  minister's  policy  of  peace,  to  seek  glory  for 
himself  and  greatness  for  France  through  new  and  unjust  en- 
croachments upon  neighboring  nations. 

The  Wars  of  Louis  XIV.  —  During  the  period  of  his  personal 
administration  of  the  government,  Louis  XIV.  was  engaged  in  four 

Fronde  must  be  regarded  as  a  memorable  struggle  of  the  aristocracy,  sup- 
ported by  the  judicial  and  municipal  bodies,  to  control  the  despotism  of  the 
crown.  ...  It  failed;  .  .  .  nor  was  any  farther  effort  made  to  resuscitate  the 
dormant  liberties  of  the  nation  until  the  dawning  of  the  great  Revolution." 


THE  SPANISH  NETHERLANDS.  593 

great  wars  :  (i)  A  war  respecting  the  Spanish  Netherlands  (1667- 
1668  ;  (2)  a  war  with  Holland  (1672-1678)  \  (3)  the  War  of  the 
Palatinate  (1689-169 7)  j  and  (4)  the  War  of  the  Spanish  Suc- 
cession ( 1 701-17 14). 

All  these  wars  were,  on  the  part  of  the  French  monarch,  wars 
of  conquest  and  aggression,  or  were  wars  provoked  by  his  ambi- 
tious and  encroaching  policy.  The  most  inveterate  enemy  of 
Louis  during  all  this  period  was  Holland,  the  representative  and 
champion  of  liberal,  constitutional  government. 

The  War  concerning  the  Spanish  Netherlands  (166  7-1 668). 
—  Upon  the  death  of  Philip  IV.  of  Spain  (1665),  Louis  immedi- 
ately claimed,  in  the  name  of  his  wife,  portions  of  the  Spanish 
Netherlands  (see  p.  568,  n.).  The  Hollanders  were  naturally 
alarmed,  fearing  that  Louis  would  also  want  to  annex  their  coun- 
try to  his  dominions.  Accordingly  they  effected  what  was  called 
the  Triple  Alliance  with  England  and  Sweden,  checked  the  French 
king  in  his  career  of  conquest,  and,  by  the  Treaty  of  Aix-la-Cha- 
pelle,  forced  him  to  give  up  much  of  the  territory  he  had  seized. 

The  War  with  Holland  (1672-1678).  —  The  second  war  of 
the  French  king  was  against  Holland,  whose  interference  with  his 
plans  in  the  Spanish  Netherlands,  as  well  as  some  uncompli- 
mentary remarks  of  the  Dutch  humorists  on  his  personal  appear- 
ance, had  stirred  his  resentment.  Before  entering  upon  the 
undertaking  which  had  proved  too  great  for  Philip  II.  with  the 
resources  of  two  worlds  at  his  command,  Louis,  by  means  of 
bribes  and  the  employment  of  that  skilful  diplomacy  of  which  he 
was  so  perfect  a  master,  prudently  drew  from  the  side  of  Holland 
both  her  allies  (Sweden  and  England),  even  inducing  the  English 
king,  Charles  II.,  to  lend  him  active  assistance.  Money  also  se- 
cured the  aid  of  several  princes  of  Germany.  Thus  the  little 
commonwealth  was  left  alone  to  contend  against  fearful  odds. 

The  brave  Hollanders  made  a  stout  defence  of  their  land.  It 
was  even  seriously  proposed  in  the  States-General,  that,  rather  than 
submit  to  the  tyranny  of  this  second  Philip,  they  should  open  the 
dykes,  bury  the  country  and  its  invaders  beneath  the  ocean,  and 


594  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

taking  their  families  and  household  goods  in  their  ships,  seek  new 
homes  in  lands  beyond  the  sea.  The  desperate  resolve  was  in 
part  executed ;  for  with  the  French  threatening  Amsterdam,  the 
dykes  were  cut,  and  all  the  surrounding  fields  were  laid  under 
water,  and  the  invaders  thus  forced  to  retreat, 

The  heroic  resistance  to  the  intruders  made  by  the  Hollanders 
in  their  half-drowned  land,  the  havoc  wrought  by  the  stout  Dutch 
sailors  among  the  fleets  of  the  allies,  and  the  diplomacy  of  the 
Dutch  statesmen,  who,  through  skilful  negotiations,  detached 
almost  all  of  the  allies  of  the  French  from  that  side,  and  brought 
them  into  alliance  with  the  republic,  —  all  these  things  soon  put 
a  very  different  face  upon  affairs,  and  Louis  found  himself  con- 
fronted by  the  armies  of  half  of  Europe. 

For  several  years  the  war  now  went  on  by  land  and  sea,  —  in 
the  Netherlands,  all  along  the  Rhine,  upon  the  English  Channel, 
in  the  Mediterranean,  and  on  the  coasts  of  the  New  World.  At 
length  an  end  was  put  to  the  struggle  by  the  Treaty  of  Nimeguen 
(1678).  Louis  gave  up  his  conquests  in  Holland,  but  kept  a 
large  number  of  towns  and  fortresses  in  the  Spanish  Netherlands, 
besides  the  province  of  Franche-Comte"  and  several  Imperial  cities 
on  his  German  frontier. 

Thus  Louis  came  out  of  this  tremendous  struggle,  in  which  half 
of  Europe  was  leagued  against  him,  with  enhanced  reputation  and 
fresh  acquisitions  of  territory.  People  now  began  to  call  him  the 
Grand  Monarch. 

The  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  (1685).  —  Louis  now 
committed  an  act  the  injustice  of  which  was  only  equalled  by  its 
folly,  —  an  act  from  which  may  be  dated  the  decline  of  his  power. 
This  was  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  the  well-known 
decree  by  which  Henry  IV.  secured  religious  freedom  to  the 
French  Protestants  (see  p.  578).  By  this  cruel  measure  all  the 
Protestant  churches  were  closed,  and  every  Huguenot  who  refused 
to  embrace  the  Roman  Catholic  faith  was  outlawed.  The  persecu- 
tion which  the  Huguenots  had  been  enduring  and  which  was  now 
greatly  increased  in  violence,  is  known  as  the  Dragonnades,  from 


REVOCATION  OF  THE   EDICT   OF  NANTES.  %        595 

the  circumstance  that  dragoons  were  quartered  upon  the  Protestant 
families,  with  full  permission  to  annoy  and  persecute  them  in  every 
way  "  short  of  violation  and  death,"  to  the  end  that  the  victims  of 
these  outrages  might  be  constrained  to  recant,  which  multitudes 
did. 

Under  the  fierce  persecutions  of  the  Dragonnades,  probably 
as  many  as  three  hundred  thousand  of  the  most  skilful  and  indus- 
trious of  the  subjects  of  Louis  were  driven  out  of  the  kingdom. 
Several  of  the  most  important  and  flourishing  of  the  French  in- 
dustries were  ruined,  while  the  manufacturing  interests  of  other 
countries,  particularly  those  of  Holland  and  England,  were  cor- 
respondingly benefited  by  the  energy,  skill,  and  capital  which  the 
exiles  carried  to  them.  Many  of  the  fugitive  Huguenots  found 
ultimately  a  refuge  in  America ;  and  no  other  class  of  emigrants, 
save  the  Puritans  of  England,  cast 

"  Such  healthful  leaven  'mid  the  elements 
That  peopled  the  new  world."  1 

The  War  of  the  Palatinate  (1689-1697).  — The  indirect  results 
of  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  were  quite  as  calamitous 
to  France  as  were  the  direct  results.  The  indignation  that  the 
barbarous  measure  awakened  among  the  Protestant  nations  of 
Europe  enabled  William  of  Orange  to  organize  a  formidable  con- 
federacy against  Louis,  known  as  the  League  of  Augsburg  (1686). 

Louis  resolved  to  attack  the  confederates.  Seeking  a  pretext 
for  beginning  hostilities,  he  laid  claim,  in  the  name  of  his  sister-in- 
law,  to  portions  of  the  Palatinate,  and  hurried  a  large  army  into 
the  country,  which  was  quickly  overrun.  But  being  unable  to 
hold  the  conquests  he  had  made,  Louis  ordered  that  the  country 
be  turned  into  a  desert.  The  Huns  of  an  Attila  could  not  have 
carried  out  more  relentlessly  the  command  than  did  the  soldiers 
of  Louis.  Churches  and  abbeys,  palaces  and  cottages,  villas  and 
cities,  were  all  given  to  the  flames. 

1  See  Baird,  History  of  the  Htiguenot  Emigration  to  America. 


596 


THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 


This  barbarous  act  of  Louis  almost  frenzied  Germany.  Another 
and  more  formidable  coalition,  known  as  the  "  Grand  Alliance," 
was  now  formed  (1689).  It  embraced  England,  Holland,  Sweden, 
Spain,  the  German  emperor,  the  Elector  Palatine,  and  the  Electors 
of  Bavaria  and  Saxony.  For  ten  years  almost  all  Europe  was 
a  great  battle-field.  Both  sides  at  length  becoming  weary  of  the 
contest  and  almost  exhausted  in  resources,  the  struggle  was  closed 
by  the  Treaty  of  Ryswick  (1697).  There  was  a  mutual  surrender 
of  conquests  made  during  the  course  of  the  war,  and  Louis  had 

also  to  give  up  some  of  the 
places  he  had  unjustly 
seized  before  the  beginning 
of  the  conflict. 

War  of  the  Spanish 
Succession  (1 701 -1 714). 
—  Barely  three  years 
passed  after  the  Treaty  of 
Ryswick  before  the  great 
powers  of  Europe  were 
involved  in  another  war, 
known  as  the  War  of  the 
Spanish  Succession. 

The  circumstances  out 
of  which  the  war  grew  were 
these  :  In  1 700  the  king 
of  Spain,  Charles  II.,  died, 
leaving  his  crown  to  Philip  of  Anjou,  a  grandson  of  Louis  XIV. 
"There  are  no  longer  any  Pyrenees,"  was  Louis's  exultant  epigram, 
meaning  of  course  that  France  and  Spain  were  now  practically  one. 
England  and  Holland  particularly  were  alarmed  at  this  virtual 
consolidation  of  these  two  powerful  kingdoms.  Consequently  a 
second  Grand  Alliance  was  soon  formed  against  France,  the  ob- 
ject of  which  was  to  dethrone  Philip  of  Anjou  and  place  upon  the 
Spanish  throne  Charles,  Archduke  of  Austria.  The  two  greatest 
generals  of  the  allies  were  the  famous  Duke  of  Marlborough  (John 


DUKE   OF   MARLBOROUGH. 
(After  a  painting  by  F.  Kneller.) 


WAR   OF  THE  SPANISH  SUCCESSION.  597 

Churchill),  the  ablest  commander,  except  Wellington  perhaps,  that 
England  has  ever  produced,  and  the  hardly  less  noted  Prince 
Eugene  of  Savoy. 

For  thirteen  years  all  Europe  was  shaken  with  war.  During  the 
progress  of  the  struggle  were  fought  some  of  the  most  memorable 
battles  in  European  history,  —  Blenheim,  Ramillies,  Oudenarde, 
and  Malplaquet,  —  in  all  of  which  the  genius  of  Marlborough  and 
the  consummate  skill  of  Prince  Eugene  won  splendid  victories  for 
the  allies. 

Finally,  changes  wrought  by  death  in  the  House  of  Austria 
brought  the  Archduke  Charles  to  the  imperial  throne.  This 
changed  the  whole  aspect  of  the  Spanish  question,  for  now  to 
place  Charles  upon  the  Spanish  throne  also  would  be  to  give  him 
a  dangerous  preponderance  of  power,  would  be,  in  fact,  to  re- 
establish the  great  monarchy  of  Charles  V.  Consequently  the 
Grand  Alliance  fell  to  pieces,  and  the  war  was  ended  by  the 
treaties  of  Utrecht  (1713)  and  Rastadt  (1714). 

By  the  provisions  of  these  treaties  the  Bourbon  prince  of  Anjou 
was  left  upon  the  Spanish  throne,  but  his  kingdom  was  pared 
away  on  every  side.  Gibraltar  and  the  island  of  Minorca  were 
ceded  to  England ;  while  Milan,  Naples,  Sardinia,  and  the  Neth- 
erlands (Spanish)  were  given  to  Austria.  France  was  forced  to 
surrender  to  England  considerable  portions  of  her  possessions  in 
the  New  World,  —  Newfoundland,  Nova  Scotia,  and  the  Hudson 
Bay  territory. 

Death  of  the  King.  —  Amidst  troubles,  perplexities,  and  afflic- 
tions, Louis  XIV.'s  long  and  eventful  reign  was  now  drawing  to  a 
close.  The  heavy  and  constant  taxes  necessary  to  meet  the  ex- 
penses of  his  numerous  wars,  and  to  maintain  an  extravagant  court, 
had  bankrupted  the  country,  and  the  cries  of  his  wretched  sub- 
jects clamoring  for  bread  could  not  be  shut  out  of  the  royal  cham- 
ber. Death,  too,  had  invaded  the  palace,  striking  down  the 
dauphin,  the  dauphiness,  and  two  grandsons  of  Louis,  leaving  as 
the  nearest  heir  to  the  throne  his  great-grandson,  a  mere  child. 
On  the  morning  of  September  1st,  1715,  the  Grand   Monarch 


598 


THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 


breathed  his  last,  bequeathing  to  this  boy  of  five  years  a  kingdom 
overwhelmed  with  debt,  and  filled  with  misery,  with  threatening 
vices  and  dangerous  discontent. 

The  Court  of  Louis  XIV. — The  Court  sustained  by  the  Grand 
Monarch  was  the  most  extravagantly  magnificent  that  Europe  has 

ever  seen.  Never  since  Nero 
erected  his  Golden  House 
upon  the  burnt  district  of 
Rome,  and  ensconcing  him- 
self amid  its  luxurious  ap- 
pointments, exclaimed, "  Now 
I  am  housed  as  a  man  ought 
to  be,"  had  prince  or  king  so 
ostentatiously  lavished  upon 
himself  the  wealth  of  an  em- 
pire. Louis  had  half  a  dozen 
palaces,  the  most  costly  of 
which  was  that  at  Versailles. 
Upon  this  and  its  surround- 
ings he  spent  fabulous  sums. 
The  palace  itself  cost  what 
would  probably  be  equal  to 
more  than  $100,000,000  with 
us.  Here  were  gathered  the 
beauty,  wit,  and  learning  of 
France.  The  royal  household  numbered  fifteen  thousand  per- 
sons, all  living  in  costly  and  luxurious  idleness  at  the  expense  of 
the  people. 

One  element  of  this  enormous  family  was  the  great  lords  of  the 
old  feudal  aristocracy.  Dispossessed  of  their  ancient  power  and 
wealth,  they  were  content  now  to  fill  a  place  in  the  royal  house- 
hold, to  be  the  king's  pensioners  and  the  elegant  embellishment  of 
his  court. 

As  we  might  well  imagine,  the  life  of  the  French  court  at  this 
period  was  shamefully  corrupt.     Vice,  however,  was  gilded.     The 


LOUIS   XIV.    IN    HIS   OLD   AGE. 


LITERATURE    UNDER  LOUIS  XIV.  599 

scandalous  immoralities  of  king  and  courtiers  were  made  attractive 
by  the  glitter  of  superficial  accomplishment  and  by  exquisite 
suavity  and  polish  of  manner. 

But  notwithstanding  its  immorality,  the  brilliancy  of  the  Court 
of  Louis  dazzled  all  Europe.  The  neighboring  courts  imitated  its 
manners  and  emulated  its  extravagances.  In  all  matters  of  taste 
and  fashion  France  gave  laws  to  the  continent,  and  the  French 
language  became  the  court  language  of  the  civilized  world. 

Literature  under  Louis  XIV.  —  Louis  gave  a  most  liberal  en- 
couragement to  men  of  letters,  thereby  making  his  reign  the 
Augustan  Age  of  French  literature.  In  this  patronage  Louis  was 
not  unselfish.  He  honored  and  befriended  poets  and  writers  of 
every  class,  because  he  thus  extended  the  reputation  of  his  court. 
These  writers,  pensioners  of  his  bounty,  filled  all  Europe  with  their 
praises  of  the  Great  King,  and  thus  made  the  most  ample  and 
grateful  return  to  Louis  for  his  favor  and  liberality. 

Almost  every  species  of  literature  was  cultivated  by  the  French 
writers  of  this  era,  yet  it  was  in  the  province  of  the  Drama  that 
the  greatest  number  of  eminent  authors  appeared.  The  three 
great  names  here  are  those  of  Corneille  (i  606-1 684),  Racine 
(1639-1699),  and  Moliere  (1622-1673). 

Decline  of  the  French  Monarchy  under  Louis  XV.  —  The  as- 
cendency of  the  House  of  Bourbon  passed  away  forever  with 
Louis  XIV.  In  passing  from  the  reign  of  the  Grand  Monarch  to 
that  of  his  successor,  Louis  XV.  (1 715-1774),  we  pass  from  the 
strongest  and  most  brilliant  reign  in  French  history  to  the  weakest 
and  most  humiliating. 

France  took  part,  but  usually  with  injury  to  her  military  reputa- 
tion, in  all  the  wars  of  this  period.  The  most  important  of  these 
were  the  War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  (see  p.  644),  and  the 
Seven  Years'  War  (see  p.  631),  known  in  America  as  the  French 
and  Indian  War,  which  resulted  in  the  loss  to  France  of  Canada 
in  the  New  World  and  of  her  Indian  possessions  in  the  Old. 

Though  thus  shorn  of  her  colonial  possessions  in  all  quarters  of 
the  globe,  France  managed  to  hold  in  Europe  the  provinces  won 


600  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

for  her  by  the  wars  and  the  diplomacy  of  Louis  XIV.,  and  even 
made  some  fresh  acquisitions  of  territory  along  the  Rhenish 
frontier. 

But  taken  all  together,  the  period  was  one  of  great  national 
humiliation :  the  French  fleet  was  almost  driv«n  from  the  sea ; 
the  martial  spirit  of  the  nation  visibly  declined  ;  and  France,  from 
the  foremost  place  among  the  states  of  Europe,  fell  to  the  position 
of  a  third  or  fourth  rate  power. 


THE  "DIVINE  RIGHT   OF  KINGS."  601 


CHAPTER    LV. 

i;X<  1LAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS :  THE  ENGLISH  REVOLUTION. 

C1603-1714.) 
I.     The  First  Two  Stuarts. 

1.   Reign  of  James  the  First  (1 603-1 625). 

The  "Divine  Right"  of  Kings  and  the  "Royal  Touch."  — 
With  the  end  of  the  Tudor  line  (see  p.  561),  James  VI.  of  Scot- 
land, son  of  Mary  Stuart,  came  to  the  English  throne,  as  James  I. 
of  England.  The  accession  of  the  House  of  Stuart  brought  Eng- 
land and  Scotland  under  the  same  sovereign,  though  each  country 
still  retained  its  own  Parliament. 

The  Stuarts  were  firm  believers  in  the  doctrine  of  the  "  Divine 
Right "  of  kings.  They  held  that  hereditary  princes  are  the  Lord's 
anointed,  and  that  their  authority  can  in  no  way  be  questioned  or 
limited  by  people,  priest,  or  Parliament.  James  L's  own  words 
were,  "  As  it  is  atheism  and  blasphemy  to  dispute  what  God  can 
do,  so  it  is  high  contempt  in  a  subject  to  dispute  what  a  king  can 
do,  or  to  say  that  the  king  cannot  do  this  or  that." 

This  doctrine  found  much  support  in  the  popular  superstition 
of  the  "  Royal  Touch."  The  king  was  believed  to  possess  the 
power  —  a  gift  transmitted  through  the  royal  line  of  England 
from  Edward  the  Confessor  —  of  healing  scrofulous  persons  by 
the  laying  on  of  hands.1  It  is  simply  the  bearing  of  this  strange 
superstition  upon  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  that 
concerns  us  now.     "The  political  importance  of  this  superstition," 

1  Consult  Lecky,  A  History  of  England  in  the  Eighteenth  Century,  Vol.  I. 
p.  73.  The  French  kings  were  also  supposed  to  possess  the  same  miraculous 
power,  inherited,  as  most  believed,  from  Ixiuis  the  Saint. 


602  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

observes  Lecky,  "  is  very  manifest.  Educated  laymen  might  deride 
it,  but  in  the  eyes  of  the  English  poor  it  was  a  visible,  palpable 
attestation  of  the  indefeasible  sanctity  of  the  royal  line.  It  placed 
the  sovereignty  entirely  apart  from  the  categories  of  mere  human 
institutions." 

By  bearing  this  superstition  in  mind,  it  will  be  easier  for  us  to 
understand  how  so  large  a  proportion  of  the  people  of  England 
could  support  the  Stuarts  in  their  extravagant  claims,  and  could 
sincerely  maintain  the  doctrine  of  the  sinfulness  of  resistance  to 
the  king. 

The  Gunpowder  Plot  (1605).  —  In  the  third  year  of  James's 
reign  was  unearthed  a  plot  to  blow  up  with  gunpowder  the  Parlia- 
ment Building,  upon  the  opening  day  of  the  Session,  when  king, 
lords,  and  commons  would  all  be  present,  and  thus  to  destroy  at 
a  single  blow  every  branch  of  the  English  Government.  This 
conspiracy,  known  as  the  Gunpowder  Plot,  was  entered  into  by 
a  few  Roman  Catholics,  because  they  were  disappointed  in  the 
course  which  the  king  had  taken  as  regards  their  religion.1  The 
leader  of  the  conspiracy,  Guy  Fawkes,  was  arrested,  and  after 
being  put  to  the  rack,  was  executed.  His  chief  accomplices  were 
also  seized  and  punished.  The  alarm  created  by  the  terrible  plot 
led  Parliament  to  enact  some  very  severe  laws  against  all  the 
Roman  Catholics  of  the  realm. 

Colonies  and  Trade  Settlements.  —  The  reign  of  James  I.  is 
signalized  by  the  commencement  of  that  system  of  colonization 
which  has  resulted  in  the  establishment  of  the  English  race  in 
almost  every  quarter  of  the  globe. 

In  the  year  1607  Jamestown,  so  named  in  honor  of  the  king, 
was  founded  in  Virginia.  This  was  the  first  permanent  English 
settlement  within  the  limits  of  the  United  States.  In  1620  some 
Separatists,  or  Pilgrims,  who  had  found  in  Holland  a  temporary 
refuge  from  persecution,  pushed  across  the  Atlantic,  and  amidst 
heroic  sufferings  and  hardships  established  the  first  settlement  in 

1  Though  son  of  the  Catholic  Mary  Stuart,  James  had  been  educated  as  a 
Protestant. 


JAMES  AND    THE   COMMONS.  603 

New  England,  and  laid  the  foundations  of  civil  liberty  in  the 
New  World. 

Besides  planting  these  settlements  in  the  New  World,  the  Eng- 
lish during  this  same  reign  established  themselves  in  the  ancient 
country  of  India.  In  1612  the  East  India  Company,  which  had 
been  chartered  by  Elizabeth  in  1600,  established  their  first  trading- 
post  at  Surat.  This  was  the  humble  beginning  of  the  gigantic 
English  empire  in  the  East. 

Contest  between  James  and  the  Commons. — We  have  made 
mention  of  James's  idea  of  the  divine  right  of  kingship.  Such  a 
view  of  royal  authority  and  privileges  was  sure  to  bring  him  into 
conflict  with  Parliament,  especially  with  the  House  of  Commons. 
He  was  constantly  dissolving  Parliament  and  sending  the  members 
home,  because  they  insisted  upon  considering  subjects  which  he 
had  told  them  they  should  let  alone. 

The  chief  matters  of  dispute  between  the  king  and  the  Com- 
mons were  the  limits  of  the  authority  of  the  former  in  matters 
touching  legislation  and  taxation,  and  the  nature  and  extent  of  the 
privileges  and  jurisdictions  of  the  latter. 

As  to  the  limits  of  the  royal  power,  James  talked  and  acted  as 
though  his  prerogatives  were  practically  unbounded.  He  issued 
proclamations  which  in  their  scope  were  really  laws,  and  then 
enforced  these  royal  edicts  by  fines  and  imprisonment,  as  though 
they  were  regular  statutes  of  Parliament.  Moreover,  taking  advan- 
tage of  some  uncertainty  in  the  law  as  regards  the  power  of  the 
king  to  collect  customs  at  the  ports  of  the  realm,  he  laid  new  and 
unusual  duties  upon  imports  and  exports.  James's  judges  were 
servile  enough  to  sustain  him  in  this  course,  some  of  them  going 
so  far  as  to  say  that  "  the  sea-ports  are  the  king's  gates,  which  he 
may  open  and  shut  to  whom  he  pleases." 

As  to  the  privileges  of  the  Commons,  that  body  insisted,  among 
other  things,  upon  their  right  to  determine  all  cases  of  contested 
election  of  their  members,  and  to  debate  freely  all  questions  con- 
cerning the  common  weal,  without  being  liable  to  prosecution  or 
imprisonment   for  words  spoken  in  the   House.     James   denied 


604  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

m. 

that  these  privileges  were  matters  of  right  pertaining  to  the  Com- 
mons, and  repeatedly  intimated  to  them  that  it  was  only  through 
his  own  gracious  permission  and  the  favor  of  his  ancestors  that 
they  were  allowed  to  exercise  these  liberties  at  all,  and  that  if 
their  conduct  was  not  more  circumspect  and  reverential,  he  should 
take  away  their  privileges  entirely. 

On  one  occasion,  the  Commons  having  ventured  to  debate 
certain  matters  of  state  which  the  king  had  forbidden  them  to 
meddle  with,  he,  in  reproving  them,  made  a  more  express  denial 
than  ever  of  their  rights  and  privileges,  which  caused  them,  in  a 
burst  of  noble  indignation,  to  enter  upon  their  journal  a  brave 
protest,  known  as  "The  Great  Protestation,"  which  declared  that 
"  the  liberties,  franchises,  privileges,  and  jurisdictions  of  Parlia- 
ment are  the  ancient  and  undoubted  birthright  and  inheritance  of 
the  subjects  of  England,  and  that  the  arduous  and  urgent  affairs 
concerning  the  king,  state,  and  defence  of  the  realm  ....  are 
proper  subjects  and  matter  of  council  and  debate  in  Parliament " 
(1621). 

When  intelligence  of  this  action  was  carried  to  the  king,  he 
instantly  sent  for  the  journal  of  the  House,  and  with  his  own  hands 
tore  out  the  leaf  containing  the  obnoxious  resolution.  Then  he 
angrily  prorogued  Parliament,  and  even  went  so  far  as  to  imprison 
several  of  the  members  of  the  Commons.  In  these  high-handed 
measures  we  get  a  glimpse  of  the  Stuart  theory  of  government, 
and  see  the  way  paved  for  the  final  break  between  king  and 
people  in  the  following  reign. 

King  James  died  in  the  year  1625,  after  a  reign  as  sovereign  of 
England  and  Scotland  of  twenty-two  years. 

Literature.  — One  of  the  most  noteworthy  literary  labors  of  the 
reign  under  review  was  a  new  translation  of  the  Bible,  known  as 
King  James's  Version.  This  royal  version  is  the  one  in  general 
use  at  the  present  day. 

The  most  noted  writers  of  James's  reign  were  a  bequest  to  it 
from  the  brilliant  era  of  Elizabeth  (see  p.  560).  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  the  petted  courtier  of  Elizabeth,  fell  on  evil  days  after 


LITERA  TURE. 


605 


her  death.  On  the  charge  of  taking  part  in  a  conspiracy  against 
the  crown,  he  was  sent  to  the  Tower,  where  he  was  kept  a  pris- 
oner for  thirteen  years.  From  the  tedium  of  his  long  confinement, 
he  found  relief  in  the  composition  of  a  History  of  the  World.  He 
was  at  last  beheaded. 

The  close  of  the  life  of  the  great  philosopher  Francis  Bacon, 
was  scarcely  less  sad  than  that  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh.  He  held 
the  office  of  Lord  Chancellor,  and  yielding  to  the  temptations  of 


THE   TOWER   OF   LONDON. 


the  corrupt  times  upon  which  he  had  fallen,  accepted  bribes  from 
the  suitors  who  brought  cases  before  him.  He  was  impeached 
and  brought  to  the  bar  of  the  House  of  Lords,  where  he  confessed 
his  guilt,  pathetically  appealing  to  his  judges  "  to  be  merciful  to  a 
broken  reed."  He  lived  only  five  years  after  his  fall  and  disgrace, 
dying  in  1626. 

Bacon  must  be  given  the  first  place  among  the  philosophers  of 
the  English-speaking  race.     His  system  is  known  as  the  Inductive 


606 


ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 


Method  of  Philosophy.  It  insists  upon  experiment  and  a  careful 
observation  of  facts  as  the  only  true  means  of  arriving  at  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  laws  of  nature. 

2.   Reign  of  Charles  the  First  (i 625-1 649). 

The  Petition  of  Right  (1628).— Charles  I.  came  to  the  throne 
with  all  his  father's  lofty  notions  about  the  divine  right  of  kings. 

Consequently  the  old  contest  between 
king  and  Parliament  was  straightway 
renewed.  The  first  two  Parliaments 
H  of  his  reign  Charles  dissolved  speed- 
ily, because  instead  of  voting  supplies 
they  persisted  in  investigating  public 
grievances.  After  the  dissolution  of 
his  second  Parliament  Charles  endeav- 
ored to  raise  the  money  he  needed  to 
j  carry  on  the  government,  by  means  of 
"benevolences"  and  forced  loans. 
But  all  his  expedients  failed  to  meet 
his  needs,  and  he  was  compelled  to  fall 
back  upon  Parliament.  The  Houses 
met,  and  promised  to  grant  him  gener- 
ous subsidies,  provided  he  would  sign 
a  certain  Petition  of  Right  which  they 
had  drawn  up.  Next  after  Magna 
Charta,  this  document  up  to  this  date 
is  the  most  noted  in  the  constitutional 
history  of  England.  It  simply  re- 
affirmed the  ancient  rights  and  privi- 
leges of  the  English  people  as  defined 
in  the  Great  Charter  and  by  the  good 
laws  of  Edward  I.  and  Edward  III. 
Four  abuses  were  provided  against :  (1)  the  raising  of  money  by 
loans,  "  benevolences,"  taxes,  etc.,  without  the  consent  of  Parlia- 
ment ;  (2)  arbitrary  imprisonment ;  (3)  the  quartering  of  soldiers  in 
private  houses  —  a  very  vexatious  thing ;  and  (4)  trial  without  jury. 


CHARLES   I.    (After 

A.  Vandyke.) 


a  painting    by 


CHARLES  RULES    WITHOUT  PARLIAMENT.  607 

Charles  was  as  reluctant  to  assent  to  the  Petition  as  King  John 
was  to  affix  his  seal  to  the  Magna  Charta  j  but  he  was  at  length 
forced  to  give  sanction  to  it  by  the  use  of  the  usual  formula,  "  Let 
it  be  law  as  desired  "  (1628). 

Charles  rules  without  Parliament  (1 629-1 640).  —  It  soon 
became  evident  that  Charles  was  utterly  insincere  when  he  put  his 
name  to  the  Petition  of  Right.  He  immediately  violated  its  pro- 
visions in  attempting  to  raise  money  by  forbidden  taxes  and  loans. 
For  eleven  years  he  ruled  without  Parliament,  thus  changing  the 
government  of  England  from  a  government  by  king,  lords,  and 
commons,  to  what  was  in  effect  an  absolute  and  irresponsible  mon- 
archy, like  that  of  France  or  Spain. 

As  is  always  the  case  under  such  circumstances,  there  were 
enough  persons  ready  to  aid  the  king  in  his  schemes  of  usurpa- 
tion. Prominent  among  his  unscrupulous  agents  were  his  minis- 
ters Thomas  Wentworth  (Earl  of  Strafford)  and  William  Laud. 
Wentworth  devoted  himself  to  establishing  the  royal  despotism  in 
civil  matters ;  while  Laud,  who  was  made  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, busied  himself  chiefly  with  exalting  above  all  human  interfer- 
ence the  king's  prerogatives  in  religious  affairs  as  the  supreme 
head  of  the  English  Church. 

All  these  high-handed  and  tyrannical  proceedings  of  Charles 
and  his  agents  were  enforced  by  certain  courts  that  had  been 
wrested  from  their  original  purpose  and  moulded  into  instruments 
of  despotism.  These  were  known  as  the  Council  of  the  North,  the 
Star  Chamber,  and  the  High  Commission  Court}  All  of  these 
courts  sat  without  jury,  and  being  composed  of  the  creatures  of 
the  king,  were  of  course  his  subservient  instruments.  Their  decis- 
ions were  unjust  and  arbitrary ;  their  punishments,  harsh  and  cruel. 

1  The  first  was  a  tribunal  established  by  Henry  VIII.,  and  was  now  em- 
ployed by  Wentworth  as  an  instrument  for  enforcing  the  king's  despotic 
authority  in  the  turbulent  northern  counties  of  England.  The  Star  Chamber 
was  a  court  of  somewhat  obscure  origin,  which  at  this  time  dealt  chiefly  with 
criminal  cases  affecting  the  government,  such  as  riot,  libel,  and  conspiracy. 
The  High  Commission  Court  was  a  tribunal  of  forty-four  commissioners, 
created  in  Elizabeth's  reign  to  enforce  the  acts  of  Supremacy  and  Uniformity. 


608  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

John  Hampden  and  Ship-Money.  —  Among  the  illegal  taxes 
levied  during  this  period  of  tyranny  was  a  species  known  as  ship- 
money,  so  called  from  the  fact  that  in  early  times  the  kings,  when 
the  realm  was  in  danger,  called  upon  the  sea-ports  and  maritime 
counties  to  contribute  ships  and  ship-material  for  the  public  ser- 
vice. Charles  and  his  agents,  in  looking  this  matter  over,  con- 
ceived the  idea  of  extending  this  tax  over  the  inland  as  well  as  the 
sea-board  counties. 

Among  those  who  refused  to  pay  the  tax  was  a  country  gentle- 
man, named  John  Hampden.  The  case  was  tried  in  the  Excheq- 
uer Chamber,  before  all  the  twelve  judges.  All  England  watched 
the  progress  of  the  suit  with  the  utmost  solicitude.  The  question 
was  argued  by  able  counsel  both  on  the  side  of  Hampden  and  of 
the  crown.  Judgment  was  finally  rendered  in  favor  of  the  king, 
although  five  of  the  twelve  judges  stood  for  Hampden.  The  case 
was  lost ;  but  the  people,  who  had  been  following  the  arguments, 
were  fully  persuaded  that  it  went  against  Hampden  simply  for  the 
reason  that  the  judges  stood  in  fear  of  the  royal  displeasure,  and 
that  they  did  not  dare  to  decide  the  case  adversely  to  the  crown. 

The  arbitrary  and  despotic  character  which  the  government  had 
now  assumed  in  both  civil  and  religious  matters,  and  the  hopeless- 
ness of  relief  or  protection  from  the  courts,  caused  thousands  to 
seek  in  the  New  World  that  freedom  and  security  which  was 
denied  them  in  their  own  land. 

The  Covenanters.  —  England  was  almost  ready  to  rise  in  open 
revolt  against  the  unbearable  tyranny.  Events  in  Scotland  hastened 
the  crisis.  The  king  was  attempting  to  impose  the  English  liturgy 
(slightly  modified)  upon  the  Scotch  Presbyterians.  At  Edinburgh 
this  led  to  a  riot,  one  of  the  women  worshippers  throwing  a  stool  at 
the  bishop  who  attempted  to  read  the  service.  The  spirit  of  resist- 
ance spread.  All  classes,  nobles  and  peasants  alike,  bound  them- 
selves by  a  solemn  covenant  to  resist  to  the  very  last  every  attempt 
to  make  innovations  in  their  religion.  From  this  act  they  became 
known  as  Covenanters  (1638). 

The  king  resolved  to  crush  the  movement  by  force,  but  he  soon 


THE  LONG  PARLIAMENT.  609 

found  that  war  could  not  be  carried  on  without  money,  and  was 
constrained  to  summon  Parliament  in  hopes  of  obtaining  a  vote  of 
supplies.  But  instead  of  making  the  king  a  grant  of  money,  the 
Commons  first  gave  their  attention  to  the  matter  of  grievances, 
whereupon  Charles  dissolved  the  Parliament.  The  Scottish  forces 
crossed  the  border,  and  the  king,  helpless,  with  an  empty  treasury 
and  a  seditious  army,  was  forced  again  to  summon  the  two  Houses. 

The  Long  Parliament.  —  Under  this  call  met  on  November  3, 
1640,  that  Parliament  which,  from  the  circumstance  of  its  lasting 
over  twelve  years,  became  known  as  the  Long  Parliament.  The 
members  of  the  Commons  of  this  Parliament  were  stern  and  deter- 
mined men,  who  were  resolved  to  put  a  check  to  the  despotic 
course  of  the  king. 

Almost  the  first  act  of  the  Commons  was  the  impeachment  and 
trial  of  Strafford  and  Laud,  as  the  most  prominent  instruments  of 
the  king's  tyranny  and  usurpation.  Both  were  finally  brought  to 
the  block.  The  three  iniquitous  and  illegal  courts  of  which  we 
have  spoken  (see  p.  607)  were  abolished.  And  the  Commons, 
to  secure  themselves  against  dissolution  before  their  work  was 
done,  enacted  a  law  which  provided  that  they  should  not  be  ad- 
journed or  dissolved  without  their  own  consent. 

Charles's  Attempt  to  seize  the  Five  Members. — An  act  of 
violence  on  the  part  of  Charles  now  precipitated  the  nation  into 
the  gulf  of  civil  war,  towards  which  events  had  been  so  rapidly 
drifting.  With  the  design  of  overawing  the  Commons,  the  king 
made  a  charge  of  treason  against  five  of  the  leading  members, 
among  whom  were  Hampden  and  Pym,  and  sent  officers  to  effect 
their  arrest;  but  the  accused  were  not  to  be  found.  The  next 
day  Charles  himself,  accompanied  to  the  door  of  the  chamber 
by  armed  attendants,  went  to  the  House,  for  the  purpose  of  seizing 
the  five  members ;  but,  having  been  forewarned  of  the  king's 
intention,  they  had  withdrawn  from  the  hall.  The  king  was  not 
long  in  realizing  the  state  of  affairs,  and  with  the  observation,  "  I 
see  the  birds  have  flown,"  withdrew  from  the  chamber. 

Charles  had  taken  a  fatal  step.     The  nation  could  not  forgive 


610  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

the  insult  offered  to  its  representatives.  All  London  rose  in  arms. 
The  king,  frightened  by  the  storm  which  he  had  raised,  fled  from 
the  city  to  York.  From  this  flight  of  Charles  from  London,  may 
be  dated  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  War  (Jan.  10,  1642). 

Having  now  traced  the  events  which  led  up  to  -this  open  strife 
between  the  king  and  his  people,  we  shall  pass  very  lightly  over 
the  incidents  of  the  struggle  itself,  and  hasten  to  speak  of  the 
Commonwealth,  to  the  establishment  of  which  the  struggle  led. 

3.   The  Civil  War  (1 642-1 649). 

The  Beginning.  —  After  the  flight  of  the  king,  negotiations  were 
entered  into  between  him  and  Parliament  with  a  view  to  a  recon- 
ciliation. The  demands  of  Parliament  were  that  the  militia,  the 
services  of  the  Church,  the  education  and  marriage  of  the  king's 
children,  and  many  other  matters  should  be  subject  to  the  control 
of  the  two  Houses.  In  making  all  these  demands  Parliament  had 
manifestly  gone  to  unreasonable  and  unconstitutional  lengths ;  but 
their  distrust  of  Charles  was  so  profound,  that  they  were  unwilling 
to  leave  in  his  hands  any  power  or  prerogative  that  might  be  per- 
verted or  abused.  Charles  refused,  as  might  have  been  and  was 
expected,  to  accede  to  the  propositions  of  Parliament,  and  un- 
furling the  royal  standard  at  Nottingham,  called  upon  all  loyal 
subjects  to  rally  to  the  support  of  their  king  (Aug.  22,  1642). 

The  Two  Parties.  — The  country  was  now  divided  into  two 
great  parties.  Those  that  enlisted  under  the  king's  standard  —  on 
whose  side  rallied,  for  the  most  part,  the  nobility,  the  gentry,  and 
the  clergy  —  were  known  as  Royalists,  or  Cavaliers ;  while  those 
that  gathered  about  the  Parliamentary  banner  were  called  Parlia- 
mentarians, or  Roundheads,  the  latter  term  being  applied  to  them 
because  many  of  their  number  cropped  their  hair  close  to  the  head, 
simply  for  the  reason  that  the  Cavaliers  affected  long  and  flowing 
locks.  The  Cavaliers,  in  the  main,  favored  the  Established  Church, 
while  the  Roundheads  were,  in  general,  Puritans.  During  the 
progress  of  the  struggle  the  Puritans  split  into  two  parties,  or 
sects,  known  as  Presbyterians  and  Independents. 


OLIVER   CROMWELL.  611 

For  six  years  England  now  suffered  even  greater  evils  than  those 
that  marked  that  earlier  civil  strife  known  as  the  Wars  of  the  Roses. 

Oliver  Cromwell  and  his  "Ironsides." — The  war  had  con- 
tinued about  three  years  when  there  came  into  prominence  among 
the  officers  of  the  Parliamentary  forces  a  man  of  destiny,  one  of 
the  great  characters  of  history,  —  Oliver  Cromwell.  During  the 
early  campaigns  of  the  war,  as  colonel  of  a  regiment  of  cavalry, 
he  had  exhibited  his  rare  genius  as  an  organizer  and  disciplinarian. 
His  regiment  became  famous  under  the  name  of  "  Cromwell's  Iron- 
sides." It  was  composed  entirely  of  "  men  of  religion."  Swear- 
ing, drinking,  and  the  usual  vices  of  the  camp  were  unknown 
among  them.  They  advanced  to  the  charge  singing  psalms.  Dur- 
ing all  the  war  the  regiment  was  never  once  beaten. 

The  Self -Denying  Ordinance  (1646).  —  In  the  course  of  the 
war  the  Puritans,  as  has  been  said,  became  divided  into  two  par- 
ties, the  Presbyterians  and  the  Independents.  The  former  desired 
to  reestablish  a  limited  monarchy;  the  latter  wished  to  sweep 
aside  the  old  constitution  and  form  a  republic. 

In  the  third  year  of  the  war  there  arose  a  struggle  as  to  which 
party  should  have  control  of  the  army.  By  means  of  what  was 
called  the  "Self-denying  Ordinance,"  which  declared  that  no 
member  of  either  House  should  hold  a  position  in  the  army,  the 
Independents  effected  the  removal  from  their  command  of  sev- 
eral conservative  noblemen.  Cromwell,  as  he  was  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  should  also  have  given  up  his  command ; 
but  the  ordinance  was  suspended  in  his  case,  so  that  he  might 
retain  his  place  as  lieutenant-general.  Sir  Thomas  Fairfax  was 
made  commander-in-chief.  Though  Cromwell  was  nominally  sec- 
ond in  command,  he  was  now  really  at  the  head  of  the  army. 

The  "  New  Model."  —  Cromwell  at  once  set  about  to  effect  the 
entire  remodelling  of  the  army  on  the  plan  of  his  favorite  Ironsides. 
His  idea  was  that  "  the  chivalry  of  the  Cavalier  must  be  met  by 
the  religious  enthusiasm  of  the  Puritan."  The  army  was  reduced 
to  20,000  men  —  all  honest,  fervent,  God-fearing,  psalm-singing 
Puritans.     When  not  fighting,  they  studied  the  Bible,  prayed  and 


612  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

sung  hymns.  Since  Godfrey  led  his  crusaders  to  the  rescue  of  the 
Holy  Sepulchre,  the  world  had  not  beheld  another  such  army  of 
religious  enthusiasts.  From  Cromwell  down  to  the  lowest  soldier 
of  the  "  New  Model,"  every  man  felt  called  of  the  Lord  to  strike 
down  all  forms  of  tyranny  in  Church  and  State. 

The  Battle  of  Naseby  (1645).  — The  temper  of  the  "New 
Model "  was  soon  tried  in  the  battle  of  Naseby,  the  decisive  en- 
gagement of  the  war.  The  Royalists  were  scattered  to  the  winds, 
and  their  cause  was  irretrievably  lost.  Charles  escaped  from  the 
field,  and  ultimately  fled  into  Scotland,  thinking  that  he  might 
rely  upon  the  loyalty  of  the  Scots  to  the  House  of  Stuart ;  but  on 
his  refusing  to  sign  the  Covenant  and  certain  other  articles,  they 
gave  him  up  to  the  English  Parliament. 

"Pride's  Purge "  (1648).  —  Now,  there  were  many  in  the  Par- 
liament who  were  in  favor  of  restoring  the  king  unconditionally  to 
his  throne,  that  is,  without  requiring  from  him  any  guaranties  that 
he  would  in  the  future  rule  in  accordance  with  the  constitution 
and  the  laws  of  the  land.  The  Independents,  which  means  Crom- 
well and  the  army,  saw  in  this  possibility  the  threatened  ruin  of  all 
their  hopes,  and  the  loss  of  all  the  fruits  of  victory.  A  high-handed 
measure  was  resolved  upon, — the  exclusion  from  the  House  of  Com- 
mons of  all  those  members  who  favored  the  restoration  of  Charles. 

Accordingly,  an  officer  by  the  name  of  Pride  was  stationed  at 
the  door  of  the  hall,  to  arrest  the  members  obnoxious  to  the  army. 
One  hundred  and  forty  members  were  thus  kept  from  their  seats, 
and  the  Commons  thereby  reduced  to  about  fifty  representatives, 
all  of  whom  of  course  were  Independents.  This  performance  was 
appropriately  called  "  Pride's  Purge."  It  was  simply  an  act  of 
military  usurpation. 

Trial  and  Execution  of  the  King.  —  The  Commons  thus 
"purged"  of  the  king's  friends  now  passed  a  resolution  for  the 
immediate  trial  of  Charles  for  treason.  A  High  Court  of  Justice, 
comprising  150  members,  was  organized,  before  which  Charles 
was  summoned.  Before  the  close  of  a  week  he  was  condemned 
to  be  executed  "  as  a  tyrant,  traitor,  murderer,  and  enemy  of  his 
country." 


THE   COMMONWEALTH.  613 

II.     The  Commonwealth  (1649-1660). 

Establishment  of  the  Commonwealth.  —  A  few  weeks  after  the 
execution  of  Charles,  the  Commons  voted  to  abolish  the  Monarchy 
and  the  House  of  Lords,  and  to  establish  a  republic,  under  the 
name  of  "  The  Commonwealth."  The  executive  power  was  lodged 
in  a  Council  of  State,  composed  of  forty-one  persons.  Of  this 
body  Bradshaw,  an  eminent  lawyer,  was  the  nominal,  but  Cromwell 
the  real,  head. 

Troubles  of  the  Commonwealth.  —  The  republic  thus  born  of 
mingled  religious  and  political  enthusiasm  was  beset  with  dangers 
from  the  very  first.  The  execution  of  Charles  had  alarmed  every 
sovereign  in  Europe.  Russia,  France,  and  Holland,  all  refused  to 
have  any  communication  with  the  ambassadors  of  the  Common- 
wealth. The  Scots,  who  too  late  repented  of  having  surrendered 
their  native  sovereign  into  the  hands  of  his  enemies,  now  hastened 
to  wipe  out  the  stain  of  their  disloyalty  by  proclaiming  his  son 
their  king,  with  the  title  of  Charles  the  Second.  The  impulsive 
Irish  also  declared  for  the  Prince ;  while  the  Dutch  began  active 
preparations  to  assist  him  in  regaining  the  throne  of  his  unfortunate 
father.  In  England  itself  the  Royalists  were  active  and  threat- 
ening. 

War  with  Ireland. — The  Commonwealth,  like  the  ancient 
republic  of  Rome,  seemed  to  gather  strength  and  energy  from 
the  very  multitude  of  surrounding  dangers.  Cromwell  was  made 
Lord- Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  and  sent  into  that  country  to  crush 
a  rising  of  the  Royalists  there.  With  his  Ironsides  he  made  quick 
and  terrible  work  of  the  conquest  of  the  island.  Having  taken  by 
storm  the  town  of  Drogheda  (1649),  ne  massacred  the  entire 
garrison,  consisting  of  three  thousand  men.  About  a  thousand 
who  had  sought  asylum  in  a  church  were  butchered  there  without 
mercy.  The  capture  of  other  towns  was  accompanied  by  massa- 
cres little  less  terrible.  The  conqueror's  march  through  the  island 
was  the  devastating  march  of  an  Attila  or  a  Zinghis  Khan.  The  fol- 
lowing is  his  own  account  of  the  manner  in  which  he  dealt  with 


614  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

the  captured  garrisons  :  "  When  they  submitted,  their  officers  were 
knocked  on  the  head,  and  every  tenth  man  of  the  soldiers  killed, 
and  the  rest  shipped  for  Barbadoes  [to  be  sold  into  slavery]." 

War  with  Scotland.  —  Cromwell  was  called  out  of  Ireland  by 
the  Council  to  lead  an  army  into  Scotland.  The  terror  of  his 
name  went  before  him,  and  the  people  fled  as  he  approached.  At 
Dunbar  he  met  the  Scotch  army.  Before  the  terrible  onset  of  the 
fanatic  Roundheads  the  Scots  were  scattered  like  chaff  before  the 
wind  (1650). 

The  following  year,  on  the  anniversary  of  the  Battle  of  Dunbar, 
Cromwell  gained  another  great  victory  over  the  Scottish  army  at 
Worcester,  and  all  Scotland  was  soon  after  forced  to  submit  to 
the  authority  of  the  Commonwealth.  Prince  Charles,  after  many 
adventurous  experiences,  escaped  across  the  Channel  into  Nor- 
mandy. 

Cromwell  ejects  the  Long  Parliament  (1653). — The  war  in 
Scotland  was  followed  by  one  with  the  Dutch.  While  this  war 
was  in  progress  Parliament  came  to  an  open  quarrel  with  the 
army.  Cromwell  demanded  of  Parliament  their  dissolution,  and 
the  calling  of  a  new  body.  This  they  refused ;  whereupon,  taking 
with  him  a  body  of  soldiers,  Cromwell  went  to  the  House,  and 
after  listening  impatiently  for  a  while  to  the  debate,  suddenly 
sprang  to  his  feet,  and,  with  bitter  reproaches,  exclaimed  :  "  I 
will  put  an  end  to  your  prating.  Get  you  gone ;  give  place  to 
better  men.  You  are  no  Parliament.  The  Lord  has  done  with 
you."  The  soldiers  rushing  in  at  a  preconcerted  signal,  the  hall 
was  cleared,  and  the  doors  locked  (1653). 

In  such  summary  manner  the  Long  Parliament,  or  the  "  Rump 
Parliament,"  as  it  was  called  in  derision  after  Pride's  Purge,  was 
dissolved,  after  having  sat  for  twelve  years.  So  completely  had 
the  body  lost  the  confidence  and  respect  of  all  parties,  that 
scarcely  a  murmur  was  heard  against  the  illegal  and  arbitrary  mode 
of  its  dissolution. 

The  Little  Parliament.  —  Cromwell  now  called  a  new  Parlia- 
ment, or  more  properly  a  convention,  summoning,  so  far  as  he 


THE  LITTLE  PARLIAMENT. 


615 


might,  only  religious,  God-fearing  men.  The  "  Little  Parliament," 
as  generally  called,  consisted  of  156  members,  mainly  religious  per- 
sons, who  spent  much  of  their  time  in  Scripture  exegesis,  prayer, 
and  exhortation.  Among  them  was  a  London  leather-merchant, 
named  Praise-God  Barebone,  who  was  especially  given  to  these 
exercises.  The  name  amused  the  people,  and  they  nicknamed 
the  Convention  the  "Praise- 
God  Barebone  Parliament." 

The  Little  Parliament  sat 
only  a  few  months,  during 
which  time,  however,  it  really 
did  some  excellent  work,  par- 
ticularly in  the  way  of  sug- 
gesting important  reforms.  It 
at  length  resigned  all  its  pow- 
ers into  the  hands  of  Crom- 
well; and  shortly  afterwards 
his  council  of  army  officers, 
fearing  the  country  would  fall 
into  anarchy,  persuaded  him 
—  though  manifesting  reluc- 
tance, he  probably  was  quite 
willing  to  be  persuaded  — 
to  accept  the  title  of  "  Lord 
Protector  of  the  Common- 
wealth." 

The  Protectorate  (1653- 
1659).  —  Cromwell's   power 

was  now  almost  unlimited.  He  was  virtually  a  dictator.  His  ad- 
ministration was  harsh  and  despotic.  He  summoned,  prorogued, 
and  dissolved  parliaments.  The  nation  was  really  under  martial  law. 
Royalists  and  active  Roman  Catholics  were  treated  with  the  ut- 
most rigor.  A  censorship  of  the  Press  was  established.  Scotland 
was  overawed  by  strong  garrisons.  The  Irish  Royalists,  rising 
against  the  "  usurper,"  were  crushed  with  remorseless  severity. 


OLIVER  CROMWELL. 


616  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

Thousands  were  massacred,  and  thousands  more  were  transported 
to  the  West  Indies  to  be  sold  as  slaves. 

While  the  resolute  and  despotic  character  of  Cromwell's  govern- 
ment secured  obedience  at  home,  its  strength  and  vigor  awakened 
the  fear  as  well  as  the  admiration  of  foreign  nations.  He  gave 
England  the  strongest,  and  in  many  respects  the  best,  government 
she  had  had  since  the  days  of  Henry  VIII.  and  Elizabeth. 

Cromwell's  Death.  —  Notwithstanding  Cromwell  was  a  man 
of  immovable  resolution  and  iron  spirit,  he  felt  sorely  the  burdens 
of  his  government,  and  was  deeply  troubled  by  the  perplexities  of 
his  position.  With  his  constitution  undermined  by  overwork  and 
anxiety,  fever  attacked  him,  and  with  gloomy  apprehensions  as  to 
the  terrible  dangers  into  which  England  might  drift  after  his  hand 
had  fallen  from  the  helm  of  affairs,  he  lay  down  to  die,  passing 
away  on  the  day  which  he  had  always  called  his  "  fortunate  day  " 
—  the  anniversary  of  his  birth,  and  also  the  anniversary  of  his 
great  victories  of  Dunbar  and  Worcester  (Sept.  3,  1658). 

Richard  Cromwell  (1658-1659).  —  Cromwell  with  his  dying 
breath  had  designated  his  son  Richard  as  his  successor  in  the 
office  of  the  Protectorate.  Richard  was  exactly  the  opposite  of 
his  father,  —  timid,  irresolute,  and  irreligious.  The  control  of 
affairs  that  had  taxed  to  the  utmost  the  genius  and  resources 
of  the  father  was  altogether  too  great  an  undertaking  for  the  inca- 
pacity and  inexperience  of  the  son.  No  one  was  quicker  to 
realize  this  than  Richard  himself,  and  after  a  rule  of  a  few  months, 
yielding  to  the  pressure  of  the  army,  whose  displeasure  he  had 
incurred,  he  resigned  the  Protectorate.  Had  he  possessed  one- 
half  the  energy  and  practical  genius  that  characterized  his  father, 
the  crown  would  probably  have  become  hereditary  in  the  family 
of  the  Cromwells,  and  their  house  might  have  been  numbered 
among  the  royal  houses  of  England. 

The  Restoration  (1660).  —  For  some  months  after  the  fall  of 
the  Protectorate  the  country  trembled  on  the  verge  of  anarchy. 
The  gloomy  outlook  into  the  future,  and  the  unsatisfactory  experi- 
ment of  the  Commonwealth,  caused  the  great  mass  of  the  Eng- 


Mt 


PURITAN  LITERATURE.  617 

lish  people  earnestly  to  desire  the  restoration  of  the  Monarchy. 
Prince  Charles,  towards  whom  the  tide  of  returning  royalty  was 
running,  was  now  in  Holland.  A  race  was  actually  run  between 
Monk,  the  leader  of  the  army,  and  Parliament,  to  see  which  should 
first  present  him  with  the  invitation  to  return  to  his  people,  and 
take  his  place  upon  the  throne  of  his  ancestors.  Amid  the  wildest 
demonstrations  of  joy,  Charles  stepped  ashore  on  the  island  from 
which  he  had  been  for  nine  years  an  exile.  As  he  observed  the 
preparations  made  for  his  reception,  and  received  from  all  parties 
the  warmest  congratulations,  he  remarked  with  pleasant  satire,  "  It 
is  my  own  fault  that  I  did  not  come  back  sooner,  for  I  find  no- 
body who  does  not  tell  me  he  has  always  longed  for  my  return." 

i.  Puritan  Literature. 

It  lights  up  the  Religious  Side  of  the  English  Revolution.  — 
No  epoch  in  history  receives  a  fresher  illustration  from  the  study 
of  its  literature  than  that  of  the  Puritan  Commonwealth.  To 
neglect  this,  and  yet  hope  to  gain  a  true  conception  of  that  won- 
derful episode  in  the  life  of  the  English  people  by  an  examination 
of  its  outer  events  and  incidents  alone,  would,  as  Green  declares, 
be  like  trying  to  form  an  idea  of  the  life  and  work  of  ancient 
Israel  from  the  Kings  and  the  Chronicles,  without  the  Psalms  and 
the  Prophets.  The  true  character  of  the  English  Revolution, 
especially  upon  its  religious  side,  must  be  sought  in  the  magnifi- 
cent Epic  of  Milton  and  the  unequalled  Allegory  of  Bunyan. 

Both  of  these  great  works,  it  is  true,  were  written  after  the  Res- 
toration, but  they  were  both  inspired  by  the  same  spirit  that  had 
struck  down  Despotism  and  set  up  the  Commonwealth.  The 
Epic  was  the  work  of  a  lonely,  disappointed  Republican;  the 
Allegory,  of  a  captive  Puritan. 

Milton  ( 1 608-1 6 74)  stands  as  the  grandest  representative  of 
Puritanism.  He  was  the  greatest  statesman  of  the  Revolution,  the 
stoutest  champion  of  English  liberties  against  the  tyranny  of  the 
House  of  Stuart.  After  the  beheading  of  Charles  I.  he  wrote 
a  famous  work  in  latin,  entitled  The  Defence  of  the  English 
People,  in  which  he  justified  the  execution  of  the  king. 


618  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

The  Restoration  forced  Milton  into  retirement,  and  the  last 
fourteen  years  of  his  life  were  passed  apart  from  the  world.  It 
was  during  these  years  that,  in  loneliness  and  blindness,  he  com- 
posed the  immortal  poems  Paradise  Lost  and  Paradise  Regained. 
The  former  is  the  "  Epic  of  Puritanism."  All  that  was  truest  and 
grandest  in  the  Puritan  character  found  expression  in  the  moral  ele- 
vation and  religious  fervor  of  this  the  greatest  of  Christian  poems. 

John  Bunyan  (1628-1688)  was  a  Puritan  non-conformist.  After 
the  Restoration,  he  was  imprisoned  for  twelve  years  in  Bedford 
jail,  on  account  of  non-conformity  to  the  established  worship.  It 
was  during  this  dreary  confinement  that  he  wrote  his  Pilgrim's 
Progress,  the  most  admirable  allegory  in  English  literature.  The 
habit  of  the  Puritan,  from  constant  study  of  the  Bible,  to  employ 
in  all  forms  of  discourse  its  language  and  imagery,  is  best  illus- 
trated in  the  pages  of  this  remarkable  work. 

III.  The  Restored  Stuarts. 
1.  Reign  of  Charles  the  Second  (1 660-1 685). 

Punishment  of  the  Regicides.  —  The  monarchy  having  been 
restored  in  the  person  of  Charles  II.,  Parliament  extended  a  gen- 
eral pardon  to  all  who  had  taken  part  in  the  late  rebellion,  save 
most  of  the  judges  who  had  condemned  Charles  I.  to  the  block. 
Thirteen  of  these  were  executed  with  the  revolting  cruelty  with 
which  treason  was  then  punished,  their  hearts  and  bowels  being 
cut  out  of  their  living  bodies.  Others  of  the  regicides  were  con- 
demned to  imprisonment  for  life.  Death  had  already  removed 
the  great  leaders  of  the  rebellion,  Cromwell,  Ireton,  and  Brad- 
shaw,  beyond  the  reach  of  Royalist  hate  ;  so  vengeance  was  taken 
upon  their  bodies.  These  were  dragged  from  their  tombs  in  West- 
minster Abbey,  hauled  to  Tyburn  in  London,  and  there,  on  the 
anniversary  of  Charles's  execution,  were  hanged,  and  afterwards 
beheaded  (1661). 

The  "New  Model"  is  disbanded.  —  This  same  Parliament,  mind- 
ful of  how  the  army  had  ruled   preceding   ones,  took   care    to 


THE   CONVENTICLE  ACT.  619 

disband,  as  soon  as  possible,  the"  New  Model."  "  With  them,"  in 
the  words  of  the  historian  Green,  "  Puritanism  laid  down  the  sword. 
It  ceased  from  the  long  attempt  to  build  up  a  kingdom  of  God  by 
force  and  violence,  and  fell  back  on  its  truer  work  of  building  up  a 
kingdom  of  righteousness  in  the  hearts  and  consciences  of  men." 

On  the  pretext,  however,  that  the  disturbed  state  of  the  realm 
demanded  special  precautions  on  the  part  of  the  government, 
Charles  retained  in  his  service  three  carefully  chosen  regiments,  to 
which  he  gave  the  name  of  Guards.  These,  very  soon  augmented 
in  number,  formed  the  nucleus  of  the  present  standing  army  of 
England. 

The  Conventicle  and  Five-Mile  Acts.  —  Early  in  the  reign  the 
services  of  the  Anglican  Church  were  restored  by  Parliament,  and 
harsh  laws  were  enacted  against  all  non-conformists.  Thus  the 
Conventicle  Act  made  it  a  crime  punishable  by  imprisonment  or 
transportation  for  more  than  five  persons  besides  the  household  to 
gather  in  any  house  or  in  any  place  for  worship,  unless  the  service 
was  conducted  according  to  the  forms  of  the  Established  Church. 

The  Five-Mile  Act  forbade  any  non-conformist  minister  who  re- 
fused to  swear  that  it  is  unlawful  to  take  arms  against  the  king 
under  any  circumstance:,  and  that  he  never  would  attempt  to 
make  any  change  in  Church  or  State  government,  to  approach 
within  five  miles  of  any  city,  corporate  town,  or  borough  sending 
members  to  Parliament.  This  harsh  act  forced  hundreds  to  give 
up  their  homes  in  the  towns,  and,  with  great  inconvenience  and 
loss,  to  seek  new  ones  in  out-of-the-way  country  places. 

Persecution  of  the  Covenanters.  —  In  Scotland  the  attempt  to 
suppress  conventicles  and  introduce  Episcopacy  was  stubbornly 
resisted  by  the  Covenanters,  who  insisted  on  their  right  to  worship 
God  in  their  own  way.  They  were  therefore  subjected  to  most 
cruel  and  unrelenting  persecution.  They  were  hunted  by  English 
troopers  over  their  native  moors  and  among  the  wild  recesses  of 
their  mountains,  whither  they  secretly  retired  for  prayer  and 
worship.  The  tales  of  the  suffering  of  the  Scotch  Covenanters  at 
the  hands  of  the  English  Protestants  form  a  most  harrowing 
chapter  of  the  records  of  the  ages  of  religious  persecution. 


620  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE  STUARTS. 

The  Fire,  the  Plague,  and  the  Dutch  War.  — The  years  from 
1664  to  1667  were  crowded  with  calamities,  —  with  war,  plague, 
and  fire.  The  poet  Dryden  not  inaptly  calls  the  year  1666,  in 
which  the  Great  Fire  at  London  added  its  horrors  to  those  of 
pestilence  and  war,  the  Annus  Mirabilis,  or  "  Year  of  Wonders." 

The  war  alluded  to  was  a  struggle  between  the  English  and 
the  Dutch,  which  grew  out  of  commercial  rivalries  (1664-166 7). 
Just  before  the  war  began,  the  English  treacherously  seized  the 
Dutch  settlement  of  New  Amsterdam  in  America,  and  changed 
its  name  to  New  York  in  honor  of  the  king's  brother,  the  Duke  of 
York. 

Early  in  the  summer  of  1665  the  city  of  London  was  swept  by 
a  woeful  plague,  the  most  terrible  visitation  the  city  had  known  since 
the  Black  Death  in  the  Middle  Ages  (see  p.  485).  Within  six 
months  100,000  of  the  population  perished. 

The  plague  was  followed,  the  next  year,  by  the  great  fire,  which 
destroyed  13,000  houses,  and  a  vast  number  of  churches  and 
public  buildings.  The  fire  was  afterwards  acknowledged  to  be, 
like  the  Great  Fire  at  Rome  in  Nero's  reign,  a  blessing  in  disguise. 
The  burnt  districts  were  rebuilt  in  a  more  substantial  way,  with 
broader  streets  and  more  airy  residences,  so  that  London  became 
a  more  beautiful  and  healthful  city  than  would  have  been  possible 
without  the  fire. 

Charles's  Intrigues  with  Louis  XIV.  —  Charles  inclined  to  the 
Catholic  worship,  and  wished  to  reestablish  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church,  because  he  thought  it  more  favorable  than  the  Anglican  to 
such  a  scheme  of  government  as  he  aimed  to  set  up  in  England.  In 
the  year  1670  he  made  a  secret  treaty  with  the  French  king,  the 
terms  and  objects  of  which  were  most  scandalous.  In  return  for 
aid  which  he  was  to  render  Louis  in  an  attack  upon  Holland,  he 
was  to  receive  from  him  a  large  sum  of  money ;  and  in  case  his 
proposed  declaration  in  favor  of  the  restoration  of  the  Catholic 
Church  produced  any  trouble  in  the  island,  the  aid  of  French 
troops.  The  scheme  was  never  consummated ;  but  these  clan- 
destine negotiations,  however,  becoming  an  open  secret,  made  the 


THE  "POPISH  PLOT?'  621 

people  very  uneasy  and  suspicious.  This  state  of  the  public 
mind  led  to  a  serious  delusion  and  panic. 

The  "Popish  Plot"  (1678).  —  A  rumor  was  started  that  the 
Catholics  had  planned  for  England  a  St.  Bartholomew  massacre. 
The  king,  the  members  of  Parliament,  and  all  Protestants  were  to 
be  massacred,  the  Catholic  Church  was  to  be  reestablished,  and  the 
king's  brother  James,  the  Duke  of  York,  a  zealous  Catholic,  was  to 
be  placed  on  the  throne.  Each  day  the  reports  of  the  conspiracy 
grew  more  exaggerated  and  wild.  Informers  sprang  up  on  every 
hand,  each  with  a  more  terrifying  story  than  the  preceding.  One 
of  these  witnesses,  Titus  Oates  by  name,  a  most  infamous  person, 
gained  an  extraordinary  notoriety  in  exposing  the  imaginary  plot. 
Many  Catholics,  convicted  solely  on  the  testimony  of  perjured 
witnesses,  became  victims  of  the  delusion  and  fraud. 

The  excitement  ftfoduced  by  the  supposed  plot  led  Parliament 
to  pass  what  was  called  the  Test  Act,  which  excluded  Catholics 
from  the  House  of  Lords.  (They  had  already  been  shut  out 
from  the  House  of  Commons  by  the  oath  of  Supremacy,  which 
was  required  of  commoners,  though  not  of  peers.)  The  disability 
created  by  this  statute  was  not  removed  from  them  until  the'present 
century,  —  in  the  reign  of  George  the  Fourth. 

Origin  of  the  Whig  and  Tory  Parties.  — Besides  shutting  Cath- 
olic peers  out  of  Parliament,  there  were  many  in  both  houses  who 
were  determined  to  exclude  the  Duke  of  York  from  the  throne. 
Those  in  favor  of  the  measure  of  exclusion  were  called  Whigs, 
those  who  opposed  it  Tories.1  We  cannot,  perhaps,  form  a  better 
general  idea  of  the  maxims  and  principles  of  these  two  parties 
than  by  calling  the  Whigs  the  political  descendants  of  the  Round- 
heads, and  the  Tories  of  the  Cavaliers.  Later,  they  became  known 
respectively  as  Liberals  and  Conservatives. 

The  King's  Death.  —  After  a  reign  of  just  a  quarter  of  a 
century,  Charles  died  in  1685,  and  was  followed  by  his  brother 
James,  whose  rule  was  destined  to  be  short  and  troubled. 

1  I  or  the  meaning  of  the  names  Whig  and  Tory,  see  Glossary. 


622  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE  STUARTS. 

2.  Reign  of  James  the  Second  (i  685-1 688). 

James's  Despotic  Course.1  —  James,  like  all  the  other  Stuarts, 
held  exalted  notions  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  to  rule  as  they 
please,  and  at  once  set  about  carrying  out  these^  ideas  in  a  most 
imprudent  and  reckless  manner.  Notwithstanding  he  had  given 
most  solemn  assurances  that  he  would  uphold  the  Anglican  Church, 
he  straightway  set  about  the  reestablishment  of  the  Roman  Cath- 
olic worship.  He  arbitrarily  prorogued  and  dissolved  Parliament. 
The  standing  army,  which  Charles  had  raised  to  10,000  men,  he 
increased  to  20,000,  and  placed  Catholics  in  many  of  its  most  im- 
portant offices.  He  formed  a  league  against  his  own  subjects  with 
Louis  XIV.  The  High  Commission  Court  of  Elizabeth,  which 
had  been  abolished  by  Parliament,  he  practically  restored  in  a 
new  ecclesiastical  tribunal  presided  over  by  the  infamous  Jeffries 
(see  note,  below) . 

The  despotic  course  of  the  king  raised  up  enemies  on  all  sides. 
No  party  or  sect,  save  the  most  zealous  Catholics,  stood  by  him. 
The  Tory  gentry  were  in  favor  of  royalty,  indeed,  but  not  of  tyr- 
anny. Thinking  to  make  friends  of  the  Protestant  dissenters, 
James  issued  a  decree  known  as  the  Declaration  of  Indulgence, 
whereby  he  suspended  all  the  laws  against  non-conformists.  This 
edict  all  the  clergy  were  ordered  to  read  from  their  pulpits. 
Almost  to  a  man  they  refused  to  do  so.  Seven  bishops  even 
dared  to  send  the  king  a  petition  and  remonstrance  against  his 
unconstitutional  proceedings. 

The  petitioners  were  thrust  into  the  Tower,  and  soon  brought 

1  James  was  barely  seated  upon  the  throne  before  the  Duke  of  Monmouth, 
an  illegitimate  son  of  Charles  II.,  who  had  been  in  exile  in  the  Netherlands, 
asserted  his  right  to  the  crown,  and  at  the  head  of  a  hundred  men  invaded 
England.  Thousands  flocked  to  his  standard,  but  in  the  battle  of  Sedgemoor 
(1685)  he  was  utterly  defeated  by  the  royal  troops.  Terrible  vengeance  was 
wreaked  upon  all  in  any  way  connected  with  the  rebellion.  The  notorious 
Chief  Justice  Jeffries,  in  what  were  called  the  "  Bloody  Assizes,"  condemned 
to  death  320  persons,  and  sentenced  841  to  transportation.  Jeffries  conducted 
the  so-called  trials  with  incredible  brutilitv. 


THE  REVOLUTION  OF  1688.  623 

to  trial  on  the  charge  of  "  seditious  libel."  The  nation  was  now 
thoroughly  aroused,  and  the  greatest  excitement  prevailed  while 
the  trial  was  progressing.  Judges  and  jury  were  overawed  by  the 
popular  demonstration,  and  the  bishops  were  acquitted.  The  news 
of  the  result  of  the  trial  was  received  not  only  by  the  people,  but 
by  the  army  as  well,  with  shouts  of  joy,  which  did  not  fail  to  reach 
even  the  dull  ears  of  the  king. 

The  Revolution  of  1688.  — The  crisis  which  it  was  easy  to  see 
was  impending  was  hastened  by  the  birth  of  a  prince,  as  this  cut 
off  the  hope  of  the  nation  that  the  crown  upon  James's  death 
would  descend  to  his  daughter  Mary,  now  wife  of  the  Prince 
of  Orange,  Stadtholder  of  Holland.  The  prospect  of  the  accession 
in  the  near  future  of  a  Protestant  and  freedom-loving  Prince  and 
Princess  had  reconciled  the  people  to  the  misgovernment  of  their 
present  despotic  and  Catholic  sovereign.  The  appearance  upon 
the  stage  of  an  infant  prince  gave  a  wholly  different  look  to  affairs, 
and,  as  we  have  said,  destroyed  all  hope  of  matters  being  righted 
by  the  ordinary  course  of  events. 

This  led  the  most  active  of  the  king's  opponents  to  resolve  to 
bring  about  at  once  what  they  had  been  inclined  to  wait  to  have 
accomplished  by  his  death.  They  sent  an  invitation  to  the  Prince 
of  Orange  to  come  over  with  such  force  as  he  could  muster  and 
take  possession  of  the  government,  pledging  him  the  united  and 
hearty  support  of  the  English  nation.  William  accepted  the  invi- 
tation, and  straightway  began  to  gather  his  fleet  and  army  for  the 
enterprise. 

Meanwhile  King  James,  in  his  blind  and  obstinate  way,  was 
rushing  on  headlong  upon  his  own  destruction.  He  seemed  abso- 
lutely blind  to  the  steady  and  rapid  drift  of  the  nation  towards  the 
point  of  open  resistance  and  revolution.  At  last,  when  the  sails 
of  the  Dutch  fleet  were  spread  for  a  descent  upon  the  English 
shores,  then  the  infatuated  despot  suddenly  realized  that  absolute 
ruin  was  impending  over  his  throne.  He  now  adopted  every 
expedient  to  avert  the  threatened  evil.  He  restored  to  cities  the 
charters  he  had  wrongfully  taken  from  them,  reinstated  magistrates 


624  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

in  the  positions  from  which  they  had  been  unjustly  deposed,  at- 
tempted to  make  friends  with  the  bishops,  and  promised  to  sus- 
tain the  Anglican  Church  and  rule  in  accordance  with  the  consti- 
tution of  the  realm. 

All  concessions  and  promises,  however,  were  in  vain.  They 
came  too  late.  The  king  was  absolutely  deserted ;  army  and 
people  went  over  in  a  body  to  the  Prince  of  Orange,  whose  fleet 
had  now  touched  the  shores  of  the  island.  Flight  alone  was  left 
him.  The  queen  with  her  infant  child  secretly  embarked  for 
France,  where  the  king  soon  after  joined  her.  The  last  act  of  the 
king  before  leaving  England  was  to  disband  the  army,  and  fling 
the  Great  Seal  into  the  Thames,  in  order  that  no  parliament  might 
be  legally  convened. 

The  first  act  of  the  Prince  of  Orange  was  to  issue  a  call  for  a 
Convention  to  provide  for  the  permanent  settlement  of  the  crown. 
This  body  met  January  22,  1689,  and  after  a  violent  debate  de- 
clared the  throne  to  be  vacant  through  James's  misconduct  and 
flight.  They  then  resolved  to  confer  the  royal  dignity  upon 
William  and  his  wife  Mary  as  joint  sovereigns  of  the  realm. 

But  this  Convention  did  not  repeat  the  error  of  the  Parliament 
that  restored  Charles  II.,  and  give  the  crown  to  the  Prince  and 
Princess  without  proper  safeguards  and  guaranties  for  the  conduct 
of  the  government  according  to  the  ancient  laws  of  the  kingdom. 
They  drew  up  the  celebrated  Declaration  of  Rights,  which  plainly 
rehearsed  all  the  old  rights  and  liberties  of  Englishmen ;  denied 
the  right  of  the  king  to  lay  taxes  or  maintain  an  army  without  the 
consent  of  Parliament ;  and  asserted  that  freedom  of  debate  was 
the  inviolable  privilege  of  both  the  Lords  and  the  Commons. 
William  and  Mary  were  required  to  accept  this  declaration,  and  to 
agree  to  rule  in  accordance  with  its  provisions,  whereupon  they 
were  declared  King  and  Queen  of  England.  In  such  manner  was 
effected  what  is  known  in  history  as  "the  Revolution  of  1688." 

3.    Literature  of  the  Restoration. 

It  reflects  the  Immorality  of  the  Age.  —  The  reigns  of  the 
restored  Stuarts  mark  the  most  corrupt  period  in  the  history  of 


LITERATURE   OF  THE  RESTORATION.  625 

English  society.  The  low  standard  of  morals,  and  the  general 
profligacy  in  manners,  especially  among  the  higher  classes,  are  in 
part  attributable  to  the  demoralizing  example  of  a  shockingly 
licentious  and  shameless  court ;  but  in  a  larger  measure,  perhaps, 
should  be  viewed  as  the  natural  reaction  from  the  over-stern, 
repellent  Puritanism  of  the  preceding  period.  The  Puritans  un- 
doubtedly erred  in  their  indiscriminate  and  wholesale  denunciation 
of  all  forms  of  harmless  amusement  and  innocent  pleasure.  They 
not  only  rebuked  gaming,  drinking,  and  profanity,  and  stopped 
bear-baiting,  but  they  closed  all  the  theatres,  forbade  the  May- 
pole dances  of  the  people,  condemned  as  paganish  the  observance 
of  Christmas,  frowned  upon  sculpture  as  idolatrous  and  indecent, 
and  considered  any  bright  color  in  dress  as  utterly  incompatible 
with  a  proper  sense  of  the  seriousness  of  life. 

Now  all  this  was  laying  too  heavy  a  burden  upon  human  nature. 
The  revolt  and  reaction  came,  as  come  they  must.  Upon  the 
Restoration,  society  swung  to  the  opposite  extreme.  In  place  of 
the  solemn-visaged,  psalm-singing  Roundhead,  we  have  the  gay, 
roistering  Cavalier.  Faith  gives  place  to  infidelity,  sobriety  to 
drunkenness,  purity  to  profligacy,  economy  to  extravagance,  Bible- 
study,  psalm-singing  and  exhorting  to  theatre-going,  profanity,  and 
carousing. 

The  literature  of  the  age  is  a  perfect  record  of  this  revolt  against 
the  "  sour  severity  "  of  Puritanism,  and  a  faithful  reflection  of  the 
unblushing  immorality  of  the  times. 

The  book  most  read  and  praised  by  Charles  II.  and  his  court, 
and  the  one  that  best  represents  the  spirit  of  the  victorious  party, 
is  the  satirical  poem  of  Hudibras  by  Samuel  Butler.  The  object 
of  the  work  is  to  satirize  the  cant  and  excesses  of  Puritanism,  just 
as  the  Don  Quixote  of  Cervantes  burlesques  the  extravagances  and 
follies  of  Chivalry. 

So  immoral  and  indecent  are  the  works  of  the  writers  for  the 
stage  of  this  period  that  they  have  acquired  the  designation  of 
"the  corrupt  dramatists."  Among  the  authors  of  this  species  of 
literature  was  the  poet  Dryden. 


626  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

IV.   The  Orange-Stuarts. 
i.    Reign  of  William  and  Mary  (1689-1702).    ■ 

The  Bill  of  Rights. —The  Revolution  of  1688,  and  the  new 
settlement  of  the  crown  upon  William  and  Mary>.  marks  an  epoch 
in  the  constitutional  history  of  England.  It  settled  forever  the 
long  dispute  between  king  and  Parliament  —  and  settled  it  in 
favor  of  the  latter.  The  Bill  of  Rights,  —  the  articles  of  the  Dec- 
laration of  Rights  (see  p.  624)  framed  into  a  law,  —  which  was 
one  of  the  earliest  acts  of  the  first  Parliament  under  William  and 
Mary,  in  effect  "transferred  sovereignty  from  the  king  to  the 
House  of  Commons."  It  asserted  plainly  that  the  kings  of  Eng- 
land derive  their  right  and  title  to  rule,  not  from  the  accident  of 
birth,  but  from  the  will  of  the  people,  and  declared  that  Parlia- 
ment might  depose  any  king,  exclude  his  heirs  from  the  throne, 
and  settle  the  crown  anew  in  another  family.  This  uprooted 
thoroughly  the  pernicious  doctrine  that  princes  have  a  divine  and 
inalienable  right  to  the  throne  of  their  ancestors,  and  when  once 
seated  on  that  throne  rule  simply  as  the  vicegerents  of  God,  above 
all  human  censure  and  control.  We  shall  hear  but  little  more  in 
England  of  this  monstrous  theory,  which  for  so  long  a  time  over- 
shadowed and  threatened  the  freedom  of  the  English  people. 

Mindful  of  Charles's  attempt  to  reestablish  the  Roman  Catholic 
worship,  the  framers  of  this  same  famous  Bill  of  Rights  further 
declared  that  all  persons  holding  communion  with  the  Church  of 
Rome  or  uniting  in  marriage  with  a  Roman  Catholic,  should  be 
"forever  incapable  to  possess,  inherit,  or  enjoy  the  crown  and 
government  of  the  realm."  Since  the  Revolution  of  1688  no 
one  of  that  faith  has  worn  the  English  crown. 

The  other  provisions  of  the  bill,  following  closely  the  language 
of  the  Declaration,  forbade  the  king  to  levy  taxes  or  keep  an  army 
in  time  of  peace  without  the  consent  of  Parliament;  demanded 
that  Parliament  should  be  frequently  assembled ;  reaffirmed,  as 
one  of  the  ancient  privileges  of  both  Houses,  perfect  freedom  of 
debate ;  and  positively  denied  the  dispensing  power  of  the  crown, 


SETTLEMENT   OF   THE  REVENUE.  627 

that  is,  the  authority  claimed  by  the  Stuarts  of  exempting  certain 
persons  from  the  penalty  of  the  law  by  a  royal  edict. 

All  of  these  provisions  now  became  inwrought  into  the  English 
Constitution,  and  from  this  time  forward  were  recognized  as  part 
of  the  fundamental  law  of  the  realm. 

Settlement  of  the  Revenue.  — The  articles  of  the  Bill  of  Rights 
were  made  effectual  by  appropriate  legislation.  One  thing  which 
had  enabled  the  Tudors  and  Stuarts  to  be  so  independent  of  Par- 
liament was  the  custom  which  prevailed  of  granting  to  each  king, 
at  the  beginning  of  his  reign,  the  ordinary  revenue  of  the  king- 
dom during  his  life.  This  income,  with  what  could  be  raised  by 
gifts,  benevolences,  monopolies,  and  similar  expedients,  had  en- 
abled despotic  sovereigns  to  administer  the  government,  wage 
war,  and  engage  in  any  wild  enterprise  just  as  his  own  individual 
caprice  or  passion  might  dictate.  All  this  was  now  changed. 
Parliament,  instead  of  granting  William  the  revenue  for  life,  re- 
stricted the  grant  to  a  single  year,  and  made  it  a  penal  offence  for 
the  officers  of  the  treasury  to  pay  out  money  otherwise  than 
ordered  by  Parliament. 

We  cannot  overestimate  the  importance  of  this  change  in  the 
English  Constitution.  It  is  this  control  of  the  purse  of  the  nation 
which  has  made  the  Commons  —  for  all  money  bills  must  originate 
in  the  Lower  House  —  the  actual  seat  of  government,  constitut- 
ing them  the  arbiters  of  peace  and  war.  By  simply  refusing  to 
vote  supplies,  they  can  paralyze  instantly  the  arm  of  the  king.1 

James  attempts  to  recover  the  Throne  :  Battle  of  the  Boyne 
(1690).  —  The  first  years  of  William's  reign  were  disturbed  by  the 
efforts  of  James  to  regain  the  throne  which  he  had  abandoned. 
In  these  attempts  he  was  aided  by  Louis  XIV.,  and  by  the  Jacob- 
ites (from  Jacobus,  Latin  for  James),  the  name  given  to  the 
adherents  of  the  exiled  king.  The  Irish  gave  William  the  most 
trouble,  but  in  the  decisive  battle  of  the  Boyne  he  gained  a  great 
victory  over  them,  and  soon  all  Ireland  acknowledged  his  authority. 

Plans  and  Death  of  William.  —  The  motive  which  had  most 

1  For  the  Mutiny  Bill,  enacted  at  this  time,  see  Glossary. 


628  ENGLAND    UNDER    THE   STUARTS. 

strongly  urged  William  to  respond  to  the  invitation  of  the  English 
revolutionists  to  assume  the  crown  of  England,  was  his  desire  to 
turn  the  arms  and  resources  of  that  country  against  the  great 
champion  of  despotism,  and  the  dangerous  neighbor  of  his  own 
native  country,  Louis  XIV.  of  France. 

The  conduct  of  Louis  in  lending  aid  to  James  in  his  attempts  to. 
regain  his  crown  had  so  inflamed  the  English  that  they  were  quite 
ready  to  support   William  in  his  wars  against  him,  and   so   the 
English  and  Dutch  sailors  fought  side  by  side  against  the  common 
enemy  in  the  War  of  the  Palatinate  (see  p.  595). 

A  short  time  after  the  Peace  of  Ryswick,  broke  out  the  War  of 
the  Spanish  Succession  (see  p.  596).  William,  as  the  uncompro- 
mising foe  of  the  ambitious  French  king,  urged  the  English  to 
enter  the  war  against  France.  An  insolent  and  perfidious  act  on 
the  part  of  Louis  caused  the  English  people  to  support  their  king 
in  this  plan  with  great  unanimity  and  heartiness.  The  matter  to 
which  we  refer  was  this.  James  II.  having  died  at  just  this  junc- 
ture of  affairs,  Louis,  disregarding  his  solemn  promises,  at  once 
acknowledged  his  son,  known  in  history  as  the  "  Pretender,"  as 
"King  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland." 

Preparations  were  now  made  for  the  war  thus  provoked  by  the 
double  sense  of  danger  and  insult.  In  the  midst  of  these  prepa- 
rations William  was  fatally  hurt  by  being  thrown  from  his  horse 
(1702).  Mary  had  died  in  1694,  and  as  they  left  no  children, 
the  crown  descended  to  the  Princess  Anne,  Mary's  sister,  who  had 
married  Prince  George  of  Denmark.  • 

2.   Reign  of  Queen  Anne  (1702-17 14). 

War  of  the  Spanish  Succession  (1 701-17 14).  —  The  War  of 
the  Spanish  Succession  covered  the  whole  of  the  reign  of  Queen 
Anne.  Of  the  causes  and  results  of  this  war,  and  of  England's 
part  in  it,  we  have  spoken  in  connection  with  the  reign  of  Louis 
XIV.  (see  p.  596)  ;  and  so,  referring  the  reader  to  the  account  of 
the  contest  there  given,  we  shall  pass  to  speak  of  another  event 
of  a  domestic  character  which  signalized  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne. 


UNION  OF  THE  PARLIAMENTS.  629 

Union  of  the  Parliaments  of  England  and  Scotland  (1707). — 
We  refer  to  the  union  of  England  and  Scotland  into  a  single  king- 
dom, under  the  name  of  Great  Britain  (1707).  It  was  only  the 
two  crowns  that  were  united  when  James  I.  came  to  the  English 
throne  :  now  the  two  Parliaments  were  united.  From  this  time 
forward  the  two  countries  were  represented  by  one  Parliament, 
and  in  time  the  name  "  British  "  becomes  the  common  designa- 
tion of  the  inhabitants  of  England,  Wales,  and  Scotland.  The 
union  was  advantageous  to  both  countries ;  for  it  was  a  union  not 
simply  of  hands,  but  of  hearts. 

Death  of  Queen  Anne:  the  Succession.  —  Queen  Anne  died 
in  the  year  1714,  leaving  no  heirs.  In  the  reign  of  William  a 
statute  known  as  the  Act  of  Settlement  had  provided  that  the 
crown,  in  default  of  heirs  of  William  and  Anne,  should  descend 
to  the  Electress  Sophia  of  Hanover  (grandchild  of  James  I.J,  or 
her  heirs,  "  being  Protestants."  The  Electress  died  only  a  short 
time  before  the  death  of  Queen  Anne  j  so,  upon  that  event,  the 
crown  descended  upon  the  head  of  the  Electress's  eldest  son 
George,  who  thus  became  the  founder  of  a  new  line  of  English 
sovereigns,  the  House  of  Hanover,  or  Brunswick,  the  family  in 
whose  hands  the  royal  sceptre  still  remains. 

Literature  under  Queen  Anne.  —  The  reign  of  Queen  Anne 
is  an  illustrious  one  in  English  literature.  Under  her  began  to 
write  a  group  of  brilliant  authors,  whose  activity  continued  on  into 
the  reign  of  her  successor,  George  I.  Their  productions  are,  many 
of  them,  of  special  interest  to  the  historian,  because  during  this 
period  there  was  an  unusually  close  connection  between  literature 
and  politics.  Literature  was  forced  into  the  service  of  party.  A 
large  portion  of  the  writings  of  the  era  is  in  the  form  of  political 
pamphlets,  wherein  all  the  resources  of  wit,  satire,  and  literary  skill 
are  exhausted  in  defending  or  ridiculing  the  opposing  principles 
and  policies  of  Whig  and  Tory. 

The  four  most  prominent  and  representative  authors  of  the  times 
were  Alexander  Pope  (1 688-1 744),  Jonathan  Swift  (166 7-1 745), 
Joseph  Addison  (1672-1719),  and  Daniel  Defoe  (1661-1731). 


630    ENGLAND    UNDER    THE  EARLIER  HANOVERIANS. 

In  the  scientific  annals  of  the  period  the  name  of  Sir  Isaac  New- 
ton (164 2-1 727)  is  most  prominent.  As  the  discoverer  of  the 
law  of  gravitation  and  the  author  of  the  Principia,  his  name  will 
ever  retain  a  high  place  among  the  few  who  belong  through 
their  genius  or  achievements  to  no  single  nation  or  age,  but  to  the 
world. 

V.     England  under  the  Earlier  Hanoverians.1 

The  Sovereign's  Loss  of  Political  Influence.  —  The  new  Han- 
overian king,  George  I.  (17 14-172 7),  was  utterly  ignorant  of  the 
language  and  the  affairs  of  the  people  over  whom  he  had  been 
called  to  rule.  He  was  not  loved  by  the  English,  but  he  was 
tolerated  by  them  for  the  reason  that  he  represented  Protestantism 
and  those  principles  of  political  liberty  for  which  they  had  so  long 
battled  with  their  Stuart  kings.  On  account  of  his  ignorance  of 
English  affairs  the  king  was  obliged  to  intrust  to  his  ministers  the 
practical  administration  of  the  government.  The  same  was  true 
in  the  case  of  George  II.  (172 7-1 760).  George  III.  (1 760-1820), 
having  been  born  and  educated  in  England,  regained  some  of  the 
old  influence  of  former  kings.  But  he  was  the  last  English  sovereign 
who  had  any  large  personal  influence  in  shaping  governmental 
policies.  Since  his  time  the  English  government  has  been  carried 
on  in  the  name  of  the  king  by  a  prime  minister,  dependent  upon 
the  will  of  the  House  of  Commons.  This  marks  an  important 
step  in  the  process  by  which  sovereignty  has  been  transferred  from 
the  Crown  to  the  People.     (For  later  steps,  see  Chap.  LXIII.) 

England  and  Continental  Affairs.  —  It  must  be  borne  in  mind 
that  the  Georges,  while  kings  of  England,  were  also  Electors  of 
Hanover  in  Germany.  These  German  dominions  of  theirs  caused 
England  to  become  involved  in  continental  quarrels  which  really 
did  not  concern  her.     Thus  she  was  drawn  into  the  War  of  the 

1  The  sovereigns  of  the  House  of  Hanover  are  George  I.  (1714-1727); 
George  II.  (1727-1760);  George  III.  (1760-1820);  George  IV.  (1820- 
1830);  William  IV.  (1830-1837);    Victoria  (1837-        )• 


I 


THE  PRETENDERS.  631 

Austrian  Succession  (see  p.  644)  in  which  she  had  no  national 
interest,  and  which  resulted  in  no  advantage  to  the  English  people. 
Hence  these  matters  may  be  passed  over  by  us  without  further 
notice  here. 

The  Pretenders.  —  Several  times  during  the  eighteenth  century 
the  exiled  Stuarts  attempted  to  get  back  the  throne  they  had  lost. 
The  last  of  these  attempts  was  made  in  1745,  when  the  "Young 
Pretender  "  (grandson  of  James  II.)  landed  in  Scotland,  effected 
a  rising  of  the  Scotch  Highlanders,  worsted  the  English  at  Preston 
Pans,  and  marched  upon  London.  Forced  to  retreat  into  Scotland, 
he  was  pursued  by  the  English,  and  utterly  defeated  at  the  battle  of 
Culloden  Moor,  —  and  the  Stuart  cause  was  ruined  forever. 

Old  French  and  Indian  War  (1 756-1 763). — Just  after  the 
middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  there  broke  out  between  the 
French  and  the  English  colonists  in  America  the  so-called  Old 
French  and  Indian  War.  The  struggle  became  blended  with 
what  in  Europe  is  known  as  the  Seven  Years'  War  (see  p.  645). 
At  first  the  war  went  disastrously  against  the  English,  —  Brad- 
dock's  attempt  against  Fort  Du  Quesne,  upon  the  march  to  which 
he  suffered  his  memorable  defeat  in  the  wilderness,  being  but  one 
of  several  ill-starred  English  undertakings.  But  in  the  year  1757, 
the  elder  William  Pitt  (afterwards  Earl  of  Chatham),  known  as 
"  the  Great  Commoner,"  came  to  the  head  of  affairs  in  England. 
Straightway  every  department  of  the  government  was  infused  with 
new  vigor.  His  own  indomitable  will  and  persistent  energy  seemed 
to  pass  into  every  subordinate  to  whom  he  intrusted  the  execution 
of  his  plans.  The  war  in  America  was  brought  to  a  speedy  and 
triumphant  close,  the  contest  being  virtually  ended  by  the  great 
victory  gained  by  the  English  under  the  youthful  Major-General 
Wolfe  over  the  French  under  Montcalm  upon  the  Heights  of 
Quebec  (1759).  By  the  Treaty  of  Paris  (1763)  France  ceded 
to  England  Canada  and  all  her  possessions  in  North  America  east 
of  the  Mississippi  River,  save  New  Orleans  and  a  little  adjoining 
land  (which,  along  with  the  French  territory  west  of  the  Mississippi, 
.had  already  been  given  to  Spain),  and  two  little  islands  in  the 


632     ENGLAND    UNDER    THE  EARLIER   HANOVERIANS. 

neighborhood  of  Newfoundland,  which  she  was  allowed  to  retain 
to  dry  fish  on. 

The  American  Revolution  (i  775-1 783). — By  a  violation  of 
one  of  the  principles  which  the  English  people  had  so  stoutly  main- 
tained against  the  Stuarts,  the  ruling  powers  in  England  now  drove 
the  American  colonies  to  revolt.  A  majority  in  Parliament  insisted 
upon  taxing  the  colonists ;  the  colonists  maintained  that  taxation 
without  representation  is  tyranny,  —  that  they  could  be  justly  taxed 
only  through  their  own  legislative  assemblies.  The  Government 
refusing  to  acknowledge  this  principle,  the  colonists  took  up 
arms  in  defence  oL  those  liberties  which  their  fathers  had  won 
with  so  hard  a  struggle  from  English  kings  on  English  soil.  The 
result  of  the  war  was  the  separation  from  the  mother-land  of  the 
thirteen  colonies  that  had  grown  up  along  the  Atlantic  seaboard,  — 
and  a  Greater  England  began  its  independent  career  in  the  New 
World. 

Legislative  Independence  of  Ireland  (1782).  —  While  the 
American  War  of  Independence  was  going  on,  the  Irish,  taking 
advantage  of  the  embarrassment  of  the  English  government,  de- 
manded legislative  independence.  Ireland  had  had  a  Parliament 
of  her  own  since  the  time  of  the  conquest  of  the  island  by  the 
English,  but  this  Irish  Parliament  was  dependent  upon  the  English 
Parliament,  which  claimed  the  power  to  bind  Ireland  by  its  laws. 
This  the  Irish  patriots  strenuously  denied,  and  now,  under  the  lead 
of  the  eloquent  Henry  Grattan,  drew  up  a  Declaration  of  Rights, 
wherein  they  demanded  the  legislative  independence  of  Ireland. 
The  principle  here  involved  was  the  same  as  that  for  which  the 
English  colonists  in  America  were  at  this  time  contending  with 
arms  in  their  hands.  Fear  of  a  revolt  led  England  to  grant  the 
demands  of  the  Irish,  and  to  acknowledge  the  independence  of 
the  Irish  Parliament. 

Thus  both  in  America  and  in  Ireland  the  principles  of  the  Polit- 
ical Revolution  triumphed.  In  Ireland,  however,  the  legislative 
independence  gained  was  soon  lost  (see  Chap.  LXIII.). 


GENERAL   REMARKS.  633 


CHAPTER    LVI. 

THE  RISE  OF  RUSSIA:    PETER  THE  GREAT. 

(1682-1725.) 

General  Remarks.  —  The  second  great  struggle  between  the 
principles  of  Liberalism  and  of  Despotism,  as  represented  by  the 
opposing  parties  in  the  English  Revolution,  took  place  in  France. 
But  before  proceeding  to  speak  of  the  French  Revolution,  we  shall 
first  trace  the  rise  of  Russia  and  of  Prussia,  as  these  two  great 
monarchies  were  destined  to  play  prominent  parts  in  that  tremen- 
dous conflict.  We  left  Russia  at  the  close  of  the  Middle  Ages  a 
semi-savage,  semi-Asiatic  power,  so  hemmed  in  by  barbarian  lands 
and  hostile  races  as,  to  be  almost  entirely  cut  off  from  intercourse 
with  the  civilized  world  (see  p.  508).  In  the  present  chapter  we 
wish  to  tell  how  she  pushed  her  lines  out  to  the  seas  on  every 
side,  —  to  the  Caspian,  the  Euxine,  and  the  Baltic.  The  main 
interest  of  our  story  gathers  about  Peter  the  Great,  whose  almost 
superhuman  strength  and  energy  lifted  the  great  barbarian  nation 
to  a  prominent  place  among  the  powers  of  Europe. 

Accession  of  Peter  the  Great  (1682).  —  The  royal  line  estab- 
lished in  Russia  by  the  old  Norseman  Ruric  (see  p.  507),  ended 
in  1589.  Then  followed  a  period  of  confusion  and  of  foreign  in- 
vasion, known  as  the  Troublous  Times,  after  which  a  prince  of  the 
celebrated  house  of  Romanoff  came  to  the  throne.  For  more  than 
half  a  century  after  the  accession  of  the  Romanoffs,  there  is  little 
either  in  the  genius  or  the  deeds  of  any  of  the  line  calculated  to 
draw  our  special  attention.  But  towards  the  close  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  there  ascended  the  Russian  throne  a  man  whose 
capacity  and  energy  and  achievements  instantly  drew  the  gaze  of 
his  contemporaries,  and  who  has  elicited  the  admiration  and 
wonder  of  all  succeeding  generations.     This  was  Peter  I.,  univer- 


634 


THE  RISE    OF  RUSSIA. 


sally  known  as  Peter  the  Great,  one  of  the  remarkable  characters 
of  history.  He  was  but  seventeen  years  of  age  when  he  assumed 
the  full  responsibilities  of  government. 

The  Conquest  of  Azof  (1696).  — At  this  time  Russia  possessed 
only  one  sea-port,  Archangel,  on  the  White  Sea,  which  harbor  for 
a  large  part  of  the  year  was  sealed  against  vessels  by  the  extreme 

cold  of  that  high  latitude. 
Russia,  consequently,  had  no 
marine  commerce  ;  there  was 
no  word  for  fleet  in  the  Rus- 
sian language.  Peter  saw 
clearly  that  the  most  urgent 
need  of  his  empire  was  out- 
lets upon  the  sea.  Hence, 
his  first  aim  was  to  wrest 
the  Baltic  shore  from  the 
grasp  of  Sweden,  and  the 
Euxine  from  the  hands  of 
the  Turks. 

In  1695  Peter  sailed  down 
the  Don  and  made  an  attack 
upon  Azof,  the  key  to  the 
Black  Sea,  but  was  unsuc- 
cessful. The  next  year,  how- 
ever, repeating  the  attempt, 
he  succeeded,  and  thus 
gained  his  first  harbor  on 
the  south. 

Peter's  First  Visit  to  the  West  (169 7-1 698).— With  a  view 
to  advancing  his  naval  projects,  Peter  about  this  time  sent  a  large 
number  of  young  Russian  nobles  to  Italy,  Holland,  and  England 
to  acquire  in  those  countries  a  knowledge  of  naval  affairs,  forbid- 
ding them  to  return  before  they  had  become  good  sailors. 

Not  satisfied  with  thus  sending  to  foreign  parts  his  young  nobil- 
ity, Peter  formed  the  somewhat  startling  resolution  of  going  abroad 


PETER   THE   GREAT. 

(After  a  painting  at  Hampton  Court,  by  G.  Kneller 

1698.) 


PETER'S  FIRST   VISIT   TO   THE    WEST.  635 

himself,  and  learning  the  art  of  ship-building  by  personal  expe- 
rience in  the  dockyards  of  Holland.  Accordingly,  in  the  year 
1697,  leaving  the  government  in  the  hands  of  three  nobles,  he 
set  out  incognito  for  the  Netherlands.  Upon  arriving  there  he 
proceeded  to  Zaandam,  a  place  a  short  distance  from  Amsterdam, 
and  there  hired  out  as  a  common  laborer  to  a  Dutch  ship- 
builder. 

Notwithstanding  his  disguise  it  was  well  enough  known  who 
the  stranger  was.  Indeed  there  was  but  little  chance  of  Peter's 
being  mistaken  for  a  Dutchman.  The  way  in  which  he  flew  about, 
and  the  terrible  energy  with  which  he  did  everything,  set  him 
quite  apart  from  the  easy-going,  phlegmatic  Hollanders. 

To  escape  the  annoyance  of  the  crowds  at  Zaandam,  Peter  left 
the  place,  and  went  to  the  docks  of  the  East  India  Company  in 
Amsterdam,  who  set  about  building  a  frigate  that  he  might  see 
the  whole  process  of  constructing  a  vessel  from  the  beginning. 
Here  he  worked  for  four  months,  being  known  among  his  fellow- 
workmen  as  Baas  or  Master  Peter. 

It  was  not  alone  the  art  of  naval  architecture  in  which  Peter  in- 
terested himself;  he  attended  lectures  on  anatomy,  studied  sur- 
gery, gaining  some  skill  in  pulling  teeth  and  bleeding,  inspected 
paper-mills,  flour-mills,  printing-presses,  and  factories,  and  visited 
cabinets,  hospitals,  and  museums,  thus  acquainting  himself  with 
every  industry  and  art  that  he  thought  might  be  advantageously 
introduced  into  his  own  country. 

From  Holland  Master  Peter  went  to  England  to  study  her  supe- 
rior naval  establishment.  Here  he  was  fittingly  received  by  King 
William  III.,  who  had  presented  Peter  while  in  Holland  with  a 
splendid  yacht  fully  armed,  and  who  now  made  his  guest  extremely 
happy  by  getting  up  for  him  a  sham  sea-fight. 

Returning  from  England  to  Holland,  Peter  went  thence  to 
Vienna,  intending  to  visit  Italy ;  but  hearing  of  an  insurrection  at 
home,  he  set  out  in  haste  for  Moscow. 

Peter's  Reforms.  —  The  revolt  which  had  hastened  Peter's  return 
from  the  West  was  an  uprising  among  the  Strelitzes,  a  body  of  sol- 


636  THE  RISE    OF  RUSSIA. 

diers  numbering  20,000  or  30,000,  organized  by  Ivan  the  Terrible 
as  a  sort  of  imperial  body-guard.  In  their  ungovernable  turbu- 
lence, they  remind  us  of  the  Pretorians  of  Rome.  The  mutiny 
settled  Peter  in  his  determination  to  rid  himself  altogether  of  the 
insolent  and  refractory  body.  Its  place  was  taken  by  a  well-dis- 
ciplined force  trained  according  to  the  tactics  of  the  Western 
nations. 

The  disbanding  of  the  seditious  guards  was  only  one  of  the 
many  reforms  effected  by  Peter.  So  intent  was  he  upon  thor- 
oughly Europeanizing  his  country,  that  he  resolved  that  his 
subjects  should  literally  clothe  themselves  in  the  "garments  of 
Western  Civilization."  Accordingly  he  abolished  the  long-sleeved, 
long-skirted  Oriental  robes  that  were  at  this  time  worn,  and  decreed 
that  everybody  save  the  clergy  should  shave,  or  pay  a  tax  on  his 
beard.  We  are  told  that  Peter  stationed  tailors  and  barbers  at 
the  gates  of  Moscow  to  cut  off  the  skirts  and  to  train  the  beards 
of  those  who  had  not  conformed  to  the  royal  regulations,  and  that 
he  himself  sheared  off  with  his  own  hands  the  offending  sleeves 
and  beards  of  his  reluctant  courtiers.  The  law  was  gradually  re- 
laxed, but  the  reform  became  so  general  that  in  the  best  society 
in  Russia  at  the  present  day  one  sees  only  smooth  faces  and  the 
Western  style  of  dress. 

As  additional  outgrowths  of  what  he  had  seen,  or  heard,  or  had 
suggested  to  him  on  his  foreign  tour,  Peter  issued  a  new  coinage, 
introduced  schools,  built  factories,  constructed  roads  and  canals, 
established  a  postal  system,  opened  mines,  framed  laws  modelled 
after  those  of  the  West,  and  reformed  the  government  of  the  towns 
in  such  a  way  as  to  give  the  citizens  some  voice  in  the  management 
of  their  local  affairs,  as  he  had  observed  was  done  in  the  Nether- 
lands and  in  England. 

Charles  XII.  of  Sweden.  —  Peter's  history  now  becomes  inter- 
twined with  that  of  a  man  quite  as  remarkable  as  himself,  Charles 
XII.  of  Sweden,  the  "  Madman  of  the  North."  Charles  was  but 
fifteen  years  of  age  when,  in  1697,  the  death  of  his  father  called  him 
to  the  Swedish  throne.    The  dominions  which  came  under  his  sway 


THE  BATTLE   OF  NARVA.  637 

embraced  not  only  Sweden,  but  Finland,  and  large  possessions 
along  the  Southern  Baltic,  —  territory  that  had  been  won  by  the 
arms  of  his  ancestors. 

Taking  advantage  of  Charles's  extreme  youth,  three  sovereigns, 
Frederick  IV.  of  Denmark,  Augustus  the  Strong,  Elector  of  Saxony 
and  King  of  Poland,  and  Peter  the  Great  of  Russia,  leagued  against 
him  (1700),  for  the  purpose  of  appropriating  such  portions  of  his 
dominions  as  they  severally  desired  to  annex  to  their  own. 

The  Battle  of  Narva  (1700).  But  the  conspirators  had  formed 
a  wrong  estimate  of  the  young  Swedish  monarch.  Notwithstanding 
the  insane  follies  in  which  he  was  accustomed  to  indulge,  he 
possessed  talent;  he  had  especially  a  remarkable  aptitude  for 
military  affairs.  With  a  well-trained  force  —  a  veteran  army  that  had 
not  yet  forgotten  the  discipline  of  the  hero  Gustavus  Adolphus  — 
Charles  now  threw  himself  first  upon  the  Danes,  and  in  two  weeks 
forced  the  Danish  king  to  sue  for  peace  ;  then  he  turned  his  little 
army  of  8,000  men  upon  the  Russian  forces  of  20,000,  which  were 
besieging  the  city  of  Narva,  on  the  Gulf  of  Finland,  and  inflicted 
upon  them  a  most  ignominious  defeat.  The  only  comment  of  the 
imperturbable  Peter  upon  the  disaster  was,  "  The  Swedes  will  have 
the  advantage  of  us  at  first,  but  they  will  teach  us  how  to  beat 
them." 

The  Founding  of  St.  Petersburg  (1703).  — After  chastising  the 
Czar1  at  Narva,  the  Swedish  king  turned  south  and  marched  into 
Poland  to  punish  Augustus  for  the  part  he  had  taken  in  the  con- 
spiracy against  him.  While  Charles  was  busied  in  this  quarter, 
Peter  was  gradually  making  himself  master  of  the  Swedish  lands 
on  the  Baltic,  and  upon  a  marshy  island  at  the  mouth  of  the  Neva 
was  laying  the  foundations  of  the  great  city  of  St.  Petersburg,  which 
he  proposed  to  make  the  western  gateway  of  his  empire. 

The  spot  selected  by  Peter  as  the  site  of  his  new  capital  was  low 
and  subject  to  inundation,  so  that  the  labor  requisite  to  make  it  fit 

1  Czar  is  probably  a  contraction  <>f  Vasor.  The  title  was  adopted  by  the 
rulers  of  Russia  l>ecause  they  regarded  themselves  as  the  successors  an<l  lu  irs  <.f 
the  Caesars  of  Rome  and  Constantinople. 


638  THE  RISE   OF  RUSSIA. 

for  building  purposes  was  simply  enormous.  But  difficulties  never 
dismayed  Peter.  In  spite  of  difficulties  the  work  was  done,  and 
the  splendid  city  stands  to-day  one  of  the  most  impressive  monu- 
ments of  the  indomitable  and  despotic  energy  of  Peter. 

Invasion  of  Russia  by  Charles  XII.  —  Meanwhile  Charles  was 
doing  very  much  as  he  pleased  with  the  king  of  Poland.  He  de- 
feated his  forces,  overran  his  dominions,  and  forced  him  to 
surrender  the  Polish  crown  in  favor  of  Stanislaus  Lesczinski  (i  706). 
With  sufficient  punishment  meted  out  to  Frederick  Augustus, 
Charles  was  ready  to  turn  his  attention  once  more  to  the  Czar.  So 
marvellous  had  been  the  success  attendant  upon  his  arms  for  the 
past  few  years,  nothing  now  seemed  impossible  to  him.  Deluded 
by  this  belief,  he  resolved  to  march  into  Russia  and  dethrone  the 
Czar,  even  as  he  had  dethroned  the  king  of  Poland. 

In  1 708,  with  an  army  of  barely  40,000  men,  Charles  marched 
boldly  across  the  Russian  frontier.  At  Pultowa  the  two  armies 
met  in  decisive  combat  (1709).  It  was  Charles's  Waterloo.  The 
Swedish  army  was  virtually  annihilated.  Escaping  with  a  few 
soldiers  from  the  field,  Charles  fled  southward,  and  found  an 
asylum  in  Turkey.1 

Close  of  Peter's  Reign.  —  In  172 1  the  Swedish  wars  which  had 
so  long  disturbed  Europe  were  brought  to  an  end  by  the  Peace  of 
Nystadt,  which  confirmed  Russia's  title  to  all  the  Southern  Baltic 
lands  that  Peter  had  wrested  from  the  Swedes.  The  undisputed 
possession  of  so  large  a  strip  of  the  Baltic  seaboard  vastly  in- 
creased the  importance  and  influence  of  Russia,  which  now 
assumed  a  place  among  the  leading  European  powers. 

In  1723  troubles  in  Persia  that  resulted  in  the  massacre  of  some 
Russians  afforded  Peter  a  pretext  for  sailing  down  the  Volga  and 

1  After  spending  five  years  in  Turkey,  Charles  returned  to  Sweden,  and 
shortly  afterwards  was  killed  at  the  siege  of  Frederickshall,  in  Norway  ( 1 7 1 8) . 
At  the  moment  of  his  death  he  was  only  thirty-six  years  of  age.  He  was  the 
strangest  character  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Perhaps  we  can  understand 
him  best  by  regarding  him,  as  his  biographer  Voltaire  says  we  must  regard 
him,  as  an  old  Norse  sea-king,  born  ten  centuries  after  his  time. 


1 


PETER'S   CHARACTER  AND    WORK.  639 

seizing  the  southern  shore  of  the  Caspian  Sea,  which  now  became 
virtually  a  Russian  lake.     This  ended  Peter's  conquests.     The 
Russian  colossus  now  "  stood  astride,  with  one  foot  on  the  Baltic ' 
and  the  other  upon  the  Caspian." 

Two  years  later,  being  then  in  his  fifty-fourth  year,  Peter  died  of 
a  fever  brought  on  by  exposure  while  aiding  in  the  rescue  of  some 
sailors  in  distress,  in  the  Gulf  of  Finland  (1725). 

Peter's  Character  and  Work.  —  Peter's  character  stands  re- 
vealed in  the  light  of  his  splendid  achievements.  Like  Charle- 
magne he  was  a  despotic  reformer.  His  theory  of  government 
was  a  rough,  brutal  one,  yet  the  exclamation  which  broke  from 
him  as  he  stood  by  the  tomb  of  Richelieu x  discloses  his  profound 
desire  to  rule  well:  "Thou  great  man,"  he  exclaimed,  " I  would 
have  given  thee  half  of  my  dominion  to  have  learned  of  thee  how 
to  govern  the  other  half."  He  planted  throughout  his  vast  empire 
the  seeds  of  Western  civilization,  and  by  his  giant  strength  lifted 
the  great  nation  which  destiny  had  placed  in  his  hands  out  of 
Asiatic  barbarism  into  the  society  of  the  European  peoples. 

The  influence  of  Peter's  life  and  work  upon  the  government  of 
Russia  was  very  different  from  what  he  intended.  It  is  true  that 
his  aggressive,  arbitrary  rule  strengthened  temporarily  autocratic 
government  in  Russia.  He  destroyed  all  checks,  ecclesiastical 
and  military,  upon  the  absolute  power  of  the  crown.  But  in 
bringing  into  his  dominions  Western  civilization,  he  introduced 
influences  which  were  destined  in  time  to  neutralize  all  he  had 
done  in  the  way  of  strengthening  the  basis  of  despotism.  He 
introduced  a  civilization  which  fosters  popular  liberties,  and  under- 
mines personal,  despotic  government. 

Reign  of  Catherine  the  Great  (1 762-1 796).  —  From  the 
death  of  Peter  on  to  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  the 
Russian  throne  was  held,  the  most  of  the  time,  by  women,  the 
most  noted  of  whom  was  Catherine  II.,  the  Great,  "the  great- 
est woman  probably,"  according  to  the  admission  of  an  English 

1  In  1 7 16  Peter  made  a  second  journey  to  the  West,  visiting  France,  Den- 
mark, and  Holland. 


640 


THE  RISE   OF  RUSSIA. 


historian  (McCarthy),  "who  ever  sat  on  a  throne,  Elizabeth  of 
England  not  even  excepted."  But  while  a  woman  of  great  genius, 
she  had  most  serious  faults  of  character,  being  incredibly  profli- 
gate and  unscrupulous. 

Carrying  out  ably  the  policy  of  Peter  the  Great,  Catherine  ex- 
tended vastly 
the  limits  of 
Russian  domin- 
ion, and  opened 
the  country 
even  more 
thoroughly 
than  he  had 
done  to  the  en- 
trance of  West- 
ern influences. 
The  most  note- 
worthy matters 
of  her  reign 
were  the  con- 
quest of  the 
Crimea  and  the 
dismember- 
ment of  Po- 
land. 

It  was  in  the  year  1 783  that  Catherine  effected  the  subjugation 
of  the  Crimea.  The  possession  of  this  peninsula  gave  Russia 
dominion  on  the  Black  Sea,  which  once  virtually  secured  by  Peter 
the  Great  had  been  again  lost  through  his  misfortunes.  Catherine 
greatly  extended  the  limits  of  her  dominion  on  the  west  at  the 
expense  of  Poland,  the  partition  of  which  state  she  planned  in 
connection  with  Frederick  the  Great  of  Prussia  and  Maria  Theresa 
of  Austria.  On  the  first  division,  which  was  made  in  1772,  the 
imperial  robbers  each  took  a  portion  of  the  spoils.  In  1 793  a 
second  partition  was  made,  this  time  between  Russia  and  Prussia ; 


CATHERINE   II.   OF   RUSSIA,    IN    HUSSAR   UNIFORM. 
(After  a  painting  by  Schebanow.) 


* 


CATHERINE    THE   GREAT.  641 

and  then,  in  1795,  a^ter  tne  suppression  of  a  determined  revolt  ot 
the  Poles  under  the  lead  of  the  patriot  Kosciusko,  a  third  and 
final  division  among  the  three  powers  completed  the  dismember- 
ment of  the  unhappy  state,  and  erased  its  name  from  the  roll  of 
the  nations.  The  territory  gained  by  Russia  in  these  transactions 
brought  her  western  frontier  close  alongside  the  civilization  of 
Central  Europe.  In  Catherine's  phrase,  Poland  had  become  her 
"  door  mat,"  upon  which  she  stepped  when  visiting  the  West. 

Besides  thus  widening  her  empire,  Catherine  labored  to  reform 
its  institutions  and  to  civilize  her  subjects.  Her  labors  in  better- 
ing the  laws  and  improving  the  administration  of  the  government, 
have  caused  her  to  be  likened  to  Solon  and  to  Lycurgus ;  while 
her  enthusiasm  for  learning  and  her  patronage  of  letters  led 
Voltaire  to  say,  "  Light  now  comes  from  the  North." 

By  the  close  of  Catherine's  reign  Russia  was  beyond  question 
one  of  the  foremost  powers  of  Europe,  the  weight  of  her  influence 
being  quite  equal  to  that  of  any  other  nation  of  the  continent. 


642  THE  RISE   OF  PRUSSIA. 


CHAPTER   LVII. 

THE   RISE   OF   PRUSSIA:    FREDERICK  THE   GREAT. 

(1740-1786.) 

The  Beginnings  of  Prussia.  —  The  foundation  of  the  Prussian 
Kingdom  was  laid  in  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century 
(161 1)  by  the  union  of  two  small  states  in  the  North  of  Germany. 
These  were   the   Mark,  or  Electorate,  of  Brandenburg  and  the 
Duchy  of  Prussia.     Brandenburg  had  been  gradually  growing  into 
prominence  since  the  tenth  century.     Its  ruler  at  this  time  was  a 
prince  of  the  now  noted  House  of  Hohenzollern,  and  was  one  of  the 
seven  princes  to  whom  belonged  the  right  of  electing  the  emperor. 
The  Great  Elector,  Frederick  William  ( 1 640-1 688). —Although 
this  new  Prussian  power  was  destined  to  become  the  champion  of 
■:^^^^M':&-  German  Protestantism,  it  acted  a  very  unwor- 
^■JP  ^u^        tny  an<^  vacillating  part  in  the  Thirty  Years' 
£,;      War.     But  just  before  the  close  of  that  strug- 
kL    gle  a  strong  man  came  to  the  throne,  Frederick 
iH^^llH    William,  better  known  as  the  Great  Elector. 
iiflftW'fflMufl  I    *^e  mmsed  vig°r  anfl  strength  into  every  de- 
1HEW:'?JH  H    partment  of  the  State,   and   acquired   such  a 
the  great  elector,   position  for  his  government  that  at  the  Peace 
(From  a  batt  e-piece.)      ^  \yestphaiia  he  was  abie  to  secure  new  terri- 
tory, which  greatly  enhanced  his  power  and  prominence  among 
the  German  princes. 

The  Great  Elector  ruled  for  nearly  half  a  century.  He  laid  the 
basis  of  the  military  power  of  Prussia  by  the  formation  of  a  stand- 
ing army,  and  transmitted  to  his  son  and  successor  a  strongly  cen- 
tralized and  despotic  authority. 

How  the  Elector  of  Brandenburg  acquired  the  Title  of  King. 
—  Frederick  III.  (1 688-1 713),  son  of  the  Great  Elector,  was  am- 


FREDERICK  III.  643 

bitio.us  for  the  title  of  king,  a  dignity  that  the  weight  and  influence 
won  for  the  Prussian  state  by  his  father  fairly  justified  him  in 
seeking.  He  saw  about  him  other  princes  less  powerful  than 
himself  enjoying  this  dignity,  and  he  too  "  would  be  a  king  and 
wear  a  crown."  The  recent  elevation  of  William  of  Orange,  Stadt- 
holder  of  Holland,  to  royal  honors  in  England  (see  p.  624),  stim- 
ulated the  Elector's  ambition. 

It  was  necessary  of  course  for  Frederick  to  secure  the  consent 
of  the  emperor,  a  matter  of  some  difficulty,  for  the  Catholic  ad- 
visers of  the  Austrian  court  were  bitterly  opposed  to  having  an 
heretical  prince  thus  honored  and  advanced,  while  the  emperor 
himself  was  not  at  all  pleased  with  the  idea.  But  the  War  of  the 
Spanish  Succession  was  just  about  to  open,  and  the  emperor  was 
extremely  anxious  to  secure  Frederick's  assistance  in  the  coming 
struggle.  Therefore,  on  condition  of  his  furnishing  him  aid  in  the 
war,  the  emperor  consented  to  Frederick's  assuming  the  new  title 
and  dignity  in  the  Duchy  of  Prussia,  which,  unlike  Brandenburg, 
did  not  form  part  of  the  empire. 

Accordingly,  early  in  the  year  1701,  Frederick,  amidst  imposing 
ceremonies,  was  crowned  and  hailed  as  king  at  Konigsberg. 
Hitherto  he  had  been  Elector  of  Brandenburg  and  Duke  of 
Prussia ;  now  he  is  Elector  of  Brandenburg  and  King  of  Prussia. 

Thus  was  a  new  king  born  among  the  kings  of  Europe.  Thus 
did  the  house  of  Austria  invest  with  royal  dignity  the  rival  house 
of  Hohenzollern.  The  event  is  a  landmark  in  German,  and  even 
in  European  history.  The  cue  of  German  history  from  this  on 
is  the  growth  of  the  power  of  the  Prussian  kings,  and  their  steady 
advance  to  imperial  honors,  and  to  the  control  of  the  affairs  of 
the  German  race. 

Frederick  William  I.  (1 713-1740).  —  The  son  and  successor 
of  the  first  Prussian  king,  known  as  Frederick  William  I.,  was  one 
of  the  most  extraordinary  characters  in  history.  He  was  a  strong, 
violent,  brutal  man,  full  of  the  strangest  freaks,  yet  in  many  re- 
spects just  the  man  for  the  times.  He  would  tolerate  no  idlers. 
He  carried  a  heavy  cane,  which  he  laid  upon  the  back  of  every 


644  THE  RISE    OF  PRUSSIA. 

unoccupied  person  he  chanced  to  find,  whether  man,  woman,  or 
child. 

Frederick  William  had  a  mania  for  big  soldiers.  With  infinite 
expense  and  trouble  he  gathered  a  regiment  of  the  biggest  men  he 
could  find,  which  was  known  as  the  "Potsdam  Giants," —  a  reg- 
iment numbering  2400  men,  some  of  whom  were  eight  feet  in 
height.  Not  only  were  the  Goliaths  of  his  own  dominions  im- 
pressed into  the  service,  but  big  men  in  all  parts  of  Europe  were 
coaxed,  bribed,  or  kidnapped  by  Frederick's  recruiting  officers. 
No  present  was  so  acceptable  to  him  as  a  giant,  and  by  the  gift  of 
a  six-footer  more  than  one  prince  bought  his  everlasting  favor. 

Rough,  brutal  tyrant  though  he  was,  Frederick  William  was  an 
able  and  energetic  ruler.  He  did  much  to  consolidate  the  power 
of  Prussia,  and  at  his  death  in  1 740  left  to  his  successor  a  con- 
siderably extended  dominion,  and  a  splendid  army  of  80,000  men. 

Frederick  the  Great  (1 740-1 786).  —  Frederick  William  was 
followed  by  his  son  Frederick  II.,  to  whom  the  world  has  agreed 
to  give  the  title  of  "  Great."  Frederick  had  a  genius  for  war,  and 
his  father  had  prepared  to  his  hand  one  of  the  most  efficient  in- 
struments of  the  art  since  the  time  of  the  Roman  legions.  The 
two  great  wars  in  which  he  was  engaged,  and  which  raised  Prussia 
to  the  first  rank  among  the  military  powers  of  Europe,  were  the 
War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  and  the  Seven  Years'  War. 

War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  (1 740-1 748).  —  Through  the 
death  of  Charles  VI.  the  Imperial  office  became  vacant  on  the  very 
year  that  Frederick  II.  ascended  the  Prussian  throne.  Charles 
was  the  last  of  the  direct  male  line  of  the  Hapsburgs,  and  disputes 
straightway  arose  respecting  the  possessions  of  the  House  of  Aus- 
tria, which  resulted  in  the  long  struggle  known  as  the  War  of  the 
Austrian  Succession. 

Now,  not  long  before  the  death  of  Charles,  he  had  bound  all 
the  leading  powers  of  Europe  in  a  sort  of  agreement  called  the 
Pragmatic  Sanction,  by  the  terms  of  which,  in  case  he  should  leave 
no  son,  all  his  hereditary  dominions  —  that  is,  the  kingdom  of  Hun- 
gary, the  kingdom  of  Bohemia,  the  archduchy  of  Austria,  and  the 


T^^S* 


WAR   OF  THE  AUSTRIAN  SUCCESSION.  645 

other  possessions  of  the  House  of  Austria  —  should  be  bestowed 
upon  his  daughter  Maria  Theresa.  But  no  sooner  was  Charles 
dead  than  a  number  of  princes  immediately  laid  claim  to  greater 
or  lesser  portions  of  these  territories.  Prominent  among  these 
claimants  was  Frederick  of  Prussia,  who  claimed  Silesia.1  Before 
Maria  Theresa  could  arm  in  defence  of  her  dominions,  Frederick 
pushed  his  army  into  Silesia  and  took  forcible  possession  of  it. 

Queen  Theresa,  thus  stripped  of  a  large  part  of  her  dominions, 
fled  into  Hungary,  and  with  all  of  a  beautiful  woman's  art  of  per- 
suasion appealed  to  her  Hungarian  subjects  to  avenge  her  wrongs. 
Her  unmerited  sufferings,  her  beauty,  her  tears,  the  little  princess 
in  her  arms,  stirred  the  resentment  and  kindled  the  ardent  loyalty 
of  the  Hungarian  nobles,  and  with  one  voice,  as  they  rang  their 
swords  in  their  scabbards,  they  swore  to  support  the  cause  of  their 
queen  with  their  estates  and  their  lives.  England  and  Sardinia 
also  threw  themselves  into  the  contest  on  Maria  Theresa's  side. 
The  war  lasted  until  1 748,  when  it  was  closed  by  the  Peace  of  Aix- 
la-Chapelle,  which  left  Silesia  in  the  hands  of  Frederick. 

The  Seven  Years'  War  (1 756-1 763).  —  The  eight  years  of 
peace  which  followed  the  war  of  the  Austrian  Succession  were 
improved  by  Frederick  in  developing  the  resources  of  his  king- 
dom and  perfecting  the  organization  and  discipline  of  his  army, 
and  by  Maria  Theresa  in  forming  a  league  of  the  chief  European 
powers  against  the  unscrupulous  despoiler  of  her  dominions.  France, 
Russia,  Poland,  Saxony,  and  Sweden,  all  entered  into  an  alliance 
with  the  queen.  Frederick  could  at  first  find  no  ally  save  Eng- 
land, —  towards  the  close  of  the  struggle  Russia  came  to  his  side, 
—  so  that  he  was  left  almost  alone  to  fight  the  combined  armies 
of  the  Continent. 

At  first  the  fortunes  of  the  war  were  all  on  Frederick's  side.  In 
the  celebrated  battles  of  Rossbach,  Leuthen,  and  Zorndorf,  he 
defeated  successively  the  French,  the  Austrians,  and  the  Russians, 

1  Charles  Albert,  Elector  of  Bavaria,  set  up  a  claim  to  the  Austrian  States. 
France,  ever  the  sworn  enemy  of  the  House  of  Austria,  lent  her  armies  to  aid 
the  Elector  in  making  good  his  pretensions. 


646  THE  RISE    OF  PRUSSIA. 

and  startled  all  Europe  into  an  acknowledgment  of  the  fact  that 
the  armies  of  Prussia  had  at  their  head  one  of  the  greatest  com- 
manders of  the  world.  His  name  became  a  household  word,  and 
everybody  coupled  with  it  the  admiring  epithet  of  "  Great." 

But  fortune  finally  deserted  him.  In  sustaining  the  unequal 
contest,  his  dominions  became  drained  of  men.  England  with- 
drew her  aid,  and  inevitable  ruin  seemed  to  impend  over  his 
throne  and  kingdom.  A  change  by  death  in  the  government  of 
Russia  now  put  a  new  face  upon  Frederick's  affairs.  In  1762 
Elizabeth  of  that  country  died,  and  Peter  III.,  an  ardent  admirer 
of  Frederick,  came  to  the  throne,  and  immediately  transferred  the 
armies  of  Russia  from  the  side  of  the  allies  to  that  of  Prussia. 
The  alliance  lasted  only  a  few  months,  Peter  being  deposed  and 
murdered  by  his  wife,  who  now  came  to  the  throne  as  Catherine 
II.  She  reversed  once  more  the  policy  of  the  Government ;  but 
the  temporary  alliance  had  given  Frederick  a  decisive  advantage, 
and  the  year  following  Peter's  act,  England  and  France  were  glad  to 
give  over  the  struggle  and  sign  the  Peace  of  Paris  (1763).  Shortly 
after  this  another  peace  (the  Treaty  of  Hubertsburg)  was  arranged 
between  Austria  and  Prussia,  and  one  of  the  most  terrible  wars  that 
had  ever  disturbed  Europe  was  over.  The  most  noteworthy  result 
of  the  war  was  the  exalting  of  the  Prussian  kingdom  to  a  most 
commanding  position  among  the  European  powers. 

Frederick's  Work :  Prussia  made  a  New  Centre  of  German 
Crystallization. — The  all-important  result  of  Frederick  the  Great's 
strong  reign  was  the  making  of  Prussia  the  equal  of  Austria,  and 
thereby  the  laying  of  the  basis  of  German  unity.  Hitherto  Ger- 
many had  been  trying  unsuccessfully  to  concentrate  about  Austria  ; 
now  there  is  a  new  centre  of  crystallization,  one  that  will  draw  to 
itself  all  the  various  elements  of  German  nationality.  The  history 
of  Germany  from  this  on  is  the  story  of  the  rivalry  of  these  two 
powers,  with  the  final  triumph  of  the  kingdom  of  the  North,  and 
the  unification  of  Germany  under  her  leadership,  Austria  being 
pushed  out  as  entitled  to  no  part  in  the  affairs  of  the  Fatherland. 
This  story  we  shall  tell  in  a  subsequent  chapter  (see  Chap.  LXL). 


CAUSES   OF   THE  DEVOLUTION.  647 


CHAPTER    LVIII. 

THE  FRENCH   REVOLUTION. 

( 1 789-1 799.) 

1.   Causes  of  the  Revolution:   the  States-General  of  1789. 

Introductory.  —  The  French  Revolution  is  in  political  what  the 
German  Reformation  is  in  ecclesiastical  history.  It  was  the  revolt 
of  the  French  people  against  royal  despotism  and  class  privilege. 
"  Liberty,  Equality,  Fraternity,"  was  the  motto  of  the  Revolu- 
tion. In  the  name  of  these  principles  the  most  atrocious  crimes 
were  indeed  committed ;  but  these  excesses  of  the  Revolution  are 
not  to  be  confounded  with  its  true  spirit  and'  aims.  The  French 
people  in  1 789  contended  for  those  same  principles  that  the  Eng- 
lish Puritans  defended  in  1640,  and  that  our  fathers  maintained  in 
1776.  It  is  only  as  we  view  them  in  this  light  that  we  can  feel  a 
sympathetic  interest  in  the  men  and  events  of  this  tumultuous 
period  of  French  history. 

Causes  of  the  Revolution.  —  Chief  among  the  causes  of  the 
French  Revolution  were  the  abuses  and  extravagances  of  the 
Bourbon  monarchy ;  the  unjust  privileges  enjoyed  by  the  nobility 
and  clergy ;  the  wretched  condition  of  the  great  mass  of  the 
people ;  and  the  revolutionary  character  and  spirit  of  French 
philosophy  and  literature.  To  these  must  be  added,  as  a  proxi- 
mate cause,  the  influence  of  the  American  Revolution.  We  shall 
speak  briefly  of  these  several  matters. 

The  Bourbon  Monarchy.  —  We  simply  repeat  what  we  have 
already  learned,  when  we  say  that  the  authority  of  the  French 
crown  under  the  Bourbons  had  become  unbearably  despotic  and 
oppressive.  The  life  of  every  person  in  the  realm  was  at  the 
arbitrary  disposal  of  the  king.     Persons  were  thrown  into  prison 


648  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

without  even  knowing  the  offence  for  which  they  were  arrested. 
The  royal  decrees  were  laws.  The  taxes  imposed  by  the  king 
were  simply  robberies  and  confiscations.  The  public  money,  thus 
gathered,  was  squandered  in  maintaining  a  court  the  scandalous 
extravagances  and  debaucheries  of  which  would  shame  a  Turkish 
Sultan. 

The  Nobility.  —  The  French  nobility,  in  the  time  of  the  Bour- 
bons, numbered  about  80,000  families.  The  order  was  simply  the 
remains  of  the  once  powerful  but  now  broken-down  feudal  aristoc- 
racy of  the  Middle  Ages.  Its  members  were  chiefly  the  pensioners 
of  the  king,  the  ornaments  of  his  court,  living  in  riotous  luxury  at 
Paris  or  Versailles.  Stripped  of  their  ancient  power,  they  still 
retained  all  the  old  pride  and  arrogance  of  their  order,  and  clung 
tenaciously  to  all  their  feudal  privileges.  Although  holding  one- 
fifth  of  the  lands  of  France,  they  paid  scarcely  any  taxes. 

The  Clergy.  —  The  clergy  formed  a  decayed  feudal  hierarchy. 
They  possessed  enormous  wealth,  the  gift  of  piety  through  many 
centuries.  Over  a  third  of  the  lands  of  the  country  was  in  their 
hands,  and  yet  this  immense  property  was  almost  wholly  exempt 
from  taxation.  The  bishops  and  abbots  were  usually  drawn  from 
the  families  of  the  nobles,  being  too  often  attracted  to  the  service 
of  the  Church  rather  by  its  princely  revenues  and  the  social  dis- 
tinction conferred  by  its  offices,  than  by  the  inducements  of  piety. 
These  "  patrician  prelates"  were  hated  alike  by  the  humbler  clergy 
and  the  people. 

The  Commons.  —  Below  the  two  privileged  orders  of  the  State 
stood  the  commons,  who  constituted  the  chief  bulk  of  the  nation, 
and  who  numbered,  at  the  commencement  of  the  Revolution,  prob- 
ably about  25,000,000.  It  is  quite  impossible  to  give  any  adequate 
idea  of  the  pitiable  condition  of  the  poorer  classes  of  the  com- 
mons throughout  the  century  preceding  the  Revolution.  The  peas- 
ants particularly  suffered  the  most  intolerable  wrongs.  They  were 
vexed  by  burdensome  feudal  regulations.  Thus  they  were  forbid- 
den to  fence  their  fields  for  the  protection  of  their  crops,  as  the 
fences  interfered  with  the  lord's  progress  in  the  hunt ;  and  they 


SPIRIT   OF  FRENCH  PHILOSOPHY.  649 

were 'even  prohibited  from  cultivating  their  fields  at  certain  sea- 
sons, as  this  disturbed  the  partridges  and  other  game.  Being  kept 
in  a  state  of  abject  poverty,  a  failure  of  crops  reduced  them  to 
absolute  starvation.  It  was  not  an  unusual  thing  to  find  women 
and  children  dead  along  the  roadways.  In  a  word,  to  use  the 
language  of  one  (F^nelon)  who  saw  all  this  misery,  France  had 
become  "  simply  a  great  hospital  full  of  woe  and  empty  of  food." 

Revolutionary  Spirit  of  French  Philosophy.  —  French  philos- 
ophy in  the  eighteenth  century  was  sceptical  and  revolutionary. 
The  names  of  the  great  writers  Rousseau  (171 2- 1778)  and  Vol- 
taire (1694-1778)  suggest  at  once  its  prevalent  tone  and  spirit. 
Rousseau  declared  that  all  the  evils  which  afflict  humanity  arise 
from  vicious,  artificial  arrangements,  such  as  the  Family,  the 
Church,  and  the  State.  Accordingly  he  would  do  away  with  these 
things,  and  have  men  return  to  a  state  of  nature  —  that  is,  to 
simplicity.    Savages,  he  declared,  were  happier  than  civilized  men. 

The  tendency  and  effect  of  this  sceptical  philosophy  was  to 
create  hatred  and  contempt  for  the  institutions  of  both  State  and 
Church,  to  foster  discontent  with  the  established  order  of  things, 
to  stir  up  an  uncontrollable  passion  for  innovation  and  change. 

Influence  of  the  American  Revolution.  —  Not  one  of  the  least 
potent  of  the  proximate  causes  of  the  French  Revolution  was  the 
successful  establishment  of  the  American  republic.  The  French 
people  sympathized  deeply  with  the  English  colonists  in  their 
struggle  for  independence.  Many  of  the  nobility,  like  Lafayette, 
offered  to  the  patriots  the  service  of  their  swords  ;  and  the  popular 
feeling  at  length  compelled  Ix)uis  XVI.  to  extend  to  them  openly 
the  aid  of  the  armies  of  France. 

The  final  triumph  of  the  cause  of  liberty  awakened  scarcely  less 
enthusiasm  and  rejoicing  in  France  than  in  America.  In  this 
young  republic  of  the  Western  world  the  French  people  saw  real- 
ized the  Arcadia  of  their  philosophers.  It  was  no  longer  a  dream. 
They  themselves  had  helped  to  make  it  real.  Here  the  Rights 
of  Man  had  been  recovered  and  vindicated.  And  now  this  liberty 
which  the  French  people  had  helped  the  American  colonists  to 
secure,  they  were  impatient  to  see  France  herself  enjoy. 


650  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

"  After  us,  the  Deluge." — The  long-gathering  tempest  is  now 
ready  to  break  over  France.  Louis  XV.  died  in  1774.  In  the 
early  part  of  his  reign  his  subjects  had  affectionately  called  him 
the  "  Well-beloved,"  but  long  before  he  laid  down  the  sceptre,  all 
their  early  love  and  admiration  had  been  turned  into  hatred  and 
contempt.  Besides  being  overbearing  and  despotic,  the  king  was 
indolent,  rapacious,  and  scandalously  profligate.  During  twenty 
years  of  his  reign  the  king  was  wholly  under  the  influence  of  the 
notorious  Madame  de  Pompadour, 

The  inevitable  issue  of  this  orgie  of  crime  and  folly  seems  to 
have  been  clearly  enough  perceived  by  the  chief  actors  in  it,  as  is 
shown  by  that  reckless  phrase  so  often  on  the  lips  of  the  king  and 
his  favorite  —  "  After  us,  the  Deluge."  And  after  them,  the  Deluge 
indeed  did  come.  The  near  thunders  of  the  approaching  tempest 
could  already  be  heard  when  Louis  XV.  lay  down  to  die. 

Calling  of  the  States-General  (1789).  —  Louis  XV.  left  the 
tottering  throne  to  his  grandson,  Louis  XVI.,  then  only  twenty 
years  of  age.  He  had  recently  been  married  to  the  fair  and  bril- 
liant Marie  Antoinette,  archduchess  of  Austria. 

The  king  called  to  his  side  successively  the  most  eminent  finan- 
ciers and  statesmen  (Maurepas,  Turgot,  Necker,  and  Calonne)  as 
his  ministers  and  advisers ;  but  their  policies  and  remedies  availed 
little  or  nothing.  The  disease  which  had  fastened  itself  upon  the 
nation  was  too  deep-seated.  The  traditions  of  the  court,  the 
rigidity  of  long-established  customs,  and  the  heartless  selfishness 
of  the  privileged  classes,  rendered  reform  and  efficient  retrench- 
ment impossible. 

In  1787  the  king  summoned  the  Notables,  a  body  composed 
chiefly  of  great  lords  and  prelates,  who  had  not  been  called  to  ad- 
vise with  the  king  since  the  reign  of  Henry  IV.  But  miserable 
counsellors  were  they  all.  Refusing  to  give  up  any  of  their  feudal 
privileges,  or  to  tax  the  property  of  their  own  orders  that  the  enor- 
mous public  burdens  which  were  crushing  the  commons  might  be 
lightened,  their  coming  together  resulted  in  nothing. 

As  a  last  resort  it  was  resolved  to  summon  the  united  wisdom  of 


THE  NATIONAL  ASSEMBLY.  651 

the  nation,  —  to  call  together  the  States- General,  the  almost- 
forgotten  assembly,  composed  of  representatives  of  the  three 
estates,  —  the  nobility,  the  clergy,  and  the  commons,  the  latter 
being  known  as  the  Tiers  £tat,  or  Third  Estate.  On  the  5th  of 
May,  1789,  a  memorable  date,  this  assembly  met  at  Versailles.  It 
was  the  first  time  it  had  been  summoned  to  deliberate  upon  the 
affairs  of  the  nation  in  the  space  of  175  years.  It  was  now  com- 
posed of  1,200  representatives,  more  than  one-half  of  whom  were 
deputies  of  the  commons.  The  eyes  of  the  nation  were  turned  in 
hope  and  expectancy  towards  Versailles.  Surely  if  the  redemption 
of  France  could  be  worked  out  by  human  wisdom,  it  would  now 
be  effected. 

2.  The  National,  or  Constituent  Assembly 
(June  17,  1789-Sept.  30,  1 791). 

The  States-General  changed  into  the  National  Assembly.  —  At 
the  very  outset  a  dispute  arose  in  the  States- General  assembly  be- 
tween the  privileged  orders  and  the  commons,  respecting  the  man- 
ner of  voting.  It  had  been  the  ancient  custom  of  the  body  to  vote 
upon  all  questions  by  orders  ;  and  thinking  that  this  custom  would 
prevail  in  the  present  assembly,  the  king  and  his  counsellors  had 
yielded  to  the  popular  demand  and  allowed  the  Third  Estate  to 
send  to  Versailles  more  representatives  than  both  the  other  orders. 
The  commons  now  demanded  that  the  voting  should  be  by  indi- 
viduals ;  for,  should  the  vote  be  taken  by  orders,  the  clergy  and 
nobility  by  combining  could  always  outvote  them.  For  five  weeks 
the  quarrel  kept  everything  at  a  standstill. 

Finally  the  commons,  emboldened  by  the  tone  of  public  opinion 
without,  took  a  decisive,  revolutionary  step.  They  declared  them- 
selves the  National  Assembly,  and  then  invited  the  other  two  orders 
to  join  them  in  their  deliberations,  giving  them  to  understand  that 
if  they  did  not  choose  to  do  so,  they  should  proceed  to  the  con- 
sideration of  public  affairs  without  them. 

Shut  out  from  the  palace,  the  Third  Estate  met  in  one  of  the 


652  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

churches  of  Versailles.  Many  of  the  clergy  had  already  joined  the 
body.  Two  days  later  the  nobility  came.  The  eloquent  Bailly, 
President  of  the  Assembly,  in  receiving  them,  exclaimed,  "This 
day  will  be  illustrious  in  our  annals ;  it  renders  the  family  com- 
plete." The  States-General  had  now  become  in  reality  the  Na- 
tional Assembly. 

Storming  of  the  Bastile  (July  14,  1789).  —  During  the  open- 
ing weeks  of  the  National  Assembly,  Paris  was  in  a  state  of  great 
excitement.  The  Bastile  was  the  old  state  prison,  the  emblem,  in 
the  eyes  of  the  people,  of  despotism.  A  report  came  that  its  guns 
were  trained  on  the  city  ;  that  provoked  a  popular  outbreak.  "  Let 
us  storm  the  Bastile,"  rang  through  the  streets.  The  mob  straight- 
way proceeded  to  lay  siege  to  the  grim  old  dungeon.  In  a  few 
hours  the  prison  fortress  was  in  their  hands.  The  walls  of  the 
hated  state  prison  were  razed  to  the  ground,  and  the  people  danced 
on  the  spot.  The  key  of  the  fortress  was  sent  as  a  "  trophy  of  the 
spoils  of  despotism  "  to  Washington  by  Lafayette. 

The  destruction  by  the  Paris  mob  of  the  Bastile  is  in  the  French 
Revolution  what  the  burning  of  the  papal  bull  by  Luther  was  to 
the  Reformation.  It  was  the  death-knell  not  only  of  Bourbon 
despotism  in  France,  but  of  royal  tyranny  everywhere.  When  the 
news  reached  England,  the  great  statesman  Fox,  perceiving  its 
significance  for  liberty,  exclaimed,  "  How  much  is  this  the  greatest 
event  that  ever  happened  in  the  world,  and  how  much  the  best !  " 

The  Emigration  of  the  Nobles.  —  The  fall  of  the  Bastile  left 
Paris  in  the  hands  of  a  triumphant  mob.  Those  suspected  of 
sympathizing  with  the  royal  party  were  massacred  without  mercy. 
The  peasantry  in  many  districts,  following  the  example  set  them 
by  the  capital,  rose  against  the  nobles,  sacked  and  burned  their 
castles,  and  either  killed  the  occupants  or  dragged  them  off  to 
prison.  This  terrorism  caused  the  beginning  of  what  is  known  as 
the  emigration  of  the  nobles,  their  flight  beyond  the  frontiers  of 
France. 

"  To  Versailles."  — An  imprudent  act  on  the  part  of  the  king 
and  his  friends  at  Versailles  brought  about  the  next  episode  in  the 


"  TO    VERSAILLES?'  653 

progress  of  the  Revolution.  The  arrival  there  of  a  body  of 
troops  was  made  the  occasion  of  a  banquet  to  the  officers  of 
the  regiment.  While  heated  with  wine,  the  young  nobles  had 
trampled  under  foot  the  national  tri-colored  cockades,  and  sub- 
stituted for  them  white  cockades,  the  emblem  of  the  Bourbons. 
The  report  of  these  proceedings  caused  in  Paris  the  wildest  excite- 
ment. Other  rumors  of  the  intended  flight  of  the  king  to  Metz, 
and  of  plots  against  the  national  cause,  added  fuel  to  the  flames. 
Besides,  bread  had  failed,  and  the  poorer  classes  were  savage  from 
hunger. 

October  5th  a  mob  of  desperate  women,  terrible  in  aspect  as 
furies,  and  armed  with  clubs  and  knives,  collected  in  the  streets  of 
Paris,  determined  upon  going  to  Versailles,  and  demanding  relief 
from  the  king  himself.  All  efforts  to  dissuade  them  from  their 
purpose  were  unavailing,  and  soon  the  Parisian  rabble  was  in 
motion.  A  horrible  multitude,  savage  as  the  hordes  that  followed 
Attila,  streamed  out  of  the  city  towards  Versailles,  about  twelve 
miles  distant.  The  National  Guards,  infected  with  the  delirium 
of  the  moment,  forced  Lafayette  to  lead  them  in  the  same  direc- 
tion.    Thus  all  day  Paris  emptied  itself  into  the  royal  suburbs. 

The  mob  encamped  in  the  streets  of  Versailles  for  the  night. 
Early  the  following  morning  they  broke  into  the  palace,  killed  two 
of  the  guards,  and  battering  down  doors  with  axes,  forced  their 
way  to  the  queen's  chamber,  who  barely  escaped  with  her  life  to 
the  king's  apartments.  The  timely  arrival  of  Lafayette  alone 
saved  the  entire  royal  family  from  being  massacred. 

The  Royal  Family  taken  to  Paris.  — The  mob  now  demanded 
that  the  king  should  return  with  them  to  Paris.  Their  object  in 
this  was  to  have  him  under  their  eye,  and  prevent  his  conspiring 
with  the  privileged  orders  to  thwart  the  plans  of  the  revolutionists. 
Louis  was  forced  to  yield  to  the  demands  of  the  people. 

The  procession  arrived  at  Paris  in  the  evening.  The  royal  fam- 
ily were  placed  in  the  Palace  of  the  Tuileries,  and  Lafayette  was 
charged  with  the  duty  of  guarding  the  king,  who  was  to  be  held 
as  a  sort  of  hostage  for  the  good  conduct  of  the  nobles  and  for- 


654  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

eign  sovereigns  while  a  constitution  was  being  prepared  by  the 
Assembly. 

Such  was  what  was  called  the  "Joyous  Entry  "  of  October  6th. 
The  palace  at  Versailles,  thus  stripped  of  royalty  and  left  bespat- 
tered with  blood,  was  never  again  to  be  occupied  as  the  residence 
of  a  king  of  France. 

The  Flight  of  the  King  (June  20,  1791).  —  For  two  years  fol- 
lowing the  Joyous  Entry  there  was  a  comparative  lull  in  the  storm 
of  the  Revolution.  The  king  was  kept  a  sort  of  prisoner  in  the 
Tuileries.  The  National  Assembly  were  making  sweeping  reforms 
both  in  Church  and  State,  and  busying  themselves  in  framing  a 
new  constitution.  The  emigrant  nobles  watched  the  course  of 
events  from  beyond  the  frontiers,  not  daring  to  make  a  move  for 
fear  the  excitable  Parisian  mob,  upon  any  hostile  step  taken  by 
them,  would  massacre  the  entire  royal  family. 

Could  the  king  only  escape  from  the  hands  of  his  captors  and 
make  his  way  to  the  borders  of  France,  then  he  could  place 
himself  at  the  head  of  the  emigrant  nobles,  and,  with  foreign  aid, 
overturn  the  National  Assembly  and  crush  the  revolutionists.  The 
flight  was  resolved  upon  and  carefully  planned.  Under  cover  of 
night  the  entire  royal  family,  in  disguise,  escaped  from  the  Tui- 
leries, and  by  post  conveyance  fled  towards  the  frontier.  When 
just  another  hour  would  have  placed  the  fugitives  in  safety  among 
friends,  the  Bourbon  features  of  the  king  betrayed  him,  and  the 
entire  party  was  arrested  and  carried  back  to  Paris. 

The  attempted  flight  of  the  royal  family  was  a  fatal  blow  to  the 
Monarchy.  Many  affected  to  regard  it  as  equivalent  to  an  act  of 
abdication  on  the  part  of  the  king.  The  people  now  began  to  talk 
of  a  republic. 

The  Clubs :  Jacobins  and  Cordeliers.  —  In  order  to  render 
intelligible  the  further  course  of  the  Revolution  we  must  here 
speak  of  two  clubs,  or  organizations,  which  came  into  prominence 
about  this  time,  and  which  were  destined  to  become  more  power- 
ful than  the  Assembly  itself,  and  to  be  the  chief  instruments  in 
inaugurating  the  Reign  of  Terror.     These  were  the  societies  of  the 


THE  LEGISLATIVE  ASSEMBLY.  655 

Jacobins  and  Cordeliers,  so  called  from  certain  old  convents  in 
which  they  were  accustomed  to  meet.  The  purpose  of  these  clubs 
was  to  watch  for  conspiracies  of  the  royalists,  and  by  constant  agi- 
tation to  keep  alive  the  flame  of  the  Revolution. 

The  New  Constitution.  —  The  work  of  the  National  Assembly 
was  now  drawing  to  a  close.  On  the  14th  of  September,  1791, 
the  new  constitution  framed  by  that  body,  and  which  made  the 
government  of  France  a  constitutional  monarchy,  was  solemnly 
ratified  by  the  king.  The  National  Assembly,  having  sat  nearly 
three  years,  then  adjourned  (Sept.  30,  1791).  The  first  scene 
in  the  drama  of  the  French  Revolution  was  ended. 

3.  The  Legislative  Assembly  (Oct.  1,  1791-Sept.  21,  1792). 

The  Three  Parties.  —  The  new  constitution  provided  for  a 
national  legislature  to  be  called  the  Legislative  Assembly.  This 
body,  comprising  745  members,  was  divided  into  three  parties : 
the  Constitutionalists,  the  Girondists,  and  the  Mountainists.  The 
Constitutionalists  of  course  supported  the  new  constitution,  being 
in  favor  of  a  limited  monarchy.  The  Girondists,  so .  called  from 
the  name  {La  Gironde)  of  the  department  whence  came  the  most 
noted  of  its  members,  wished  to  establish  in  France  such  a  republic 
as  the  American  colonists  had  just  set  up  in  the  New  World. 
The  Mountainists,  who  took  their  name  from  their  lofty  seats  in 
the  assembly,  were  radical  republicans,  or  levellers.  Many  of  them 
were  members  of  the  Jacobin  club  or  that  of  the  Cordeliers.  The 
lea'ders  of  this  faction  were  Marat,  Danton,  and  Robespierre,  — 
names  of  terror  in  the  subsequent  records  of  the  Revolution. 

War  with  the  Old  Monarchies.  — The  kings  of  Europe  were 
watching  with  the  utmost  anxiety  the  course  of  events  in  France. 
They  regarded  the  cause  of  Louis  XVI.  as  their  own.  If  the 
French  people  should  be  allowed  to  overturn  the  throne  of  their 
hereditary  sovereign,  who  would  then  respect  the  divine  rights 
of  kings?  The  old  monarchies  of  Europe  therefore  resolved 
that  the  revolutionary  movement  in  Prance,  a  movement  threat- 
ening all  aristocratical  and  monarchical   institutions,  should   be 


656  THE   FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

crushed,  and  that  these  heretical  French  doctrines  respecting  the 
Sovereignty  of  the  People  and  the  Rights  of  Man  should  be  proved 
false  by  the  power  of  royal  armies. 

The  warlike  preparations  of  Frederick  William  III.  of  Prussia 
and  the  Emperor  Francis  II.,  awakened  the  apprehensions  of  the 
revolutionists,  and  led  the  Legislative  Assembly  to  declare  war 
against  them  (April  20,  1792).  A  little  later,  the  allied  armies  of 
the  Austrians  and  Prussians,  numbering  more  than  100,000  men, 
and  made  up  in  part  of  the  French  emigrant  nobles,  passed  the 
frontiers  of  France.  Thus  were  taken  the  first  steps  in  a  series  of 
wars  which  were  destined  to  last  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century,  and 
in  which  France  almost  single-handed  was  to  struggle  against  the 
leagued  powers  of  Europe,  and  to  illustrate  the  miracles  possible 
to  enthusiasm  and  genius. 

The  Massacre  of  the  Swiss  Guards  (Aug.  10,  1792).  —  The 
allies  at  first  gained  easy  victories  over  the  ill-disciplined  forces  of 
the  Legislative  Assembly,  and  the  Duke  of  Brunswick,  at  the  head 
of  an  immense  army,  advanced  rapidly  upon  Paris.  An  insolent 
proclamation  which  this  commander  now  issued,  wherein  he  or- 
dered the  French  nation  to  submit  to  their  king,  and  threatened 
the  Parisians  with  the  destruction  of  their  city  should  any  harm  be 
done  the  royal  family,  drove  the  French  people  frantic  with  indig- 
nation and  rage.  The  Palace  of  the  Tuileries,  defended  by  a  few 
hundred  Swiss  soldiers,  the  remnant  of  the  royal  guard,  was  as- 
saulted. A  terrible  struggle  followed  in  the  corridors  and  upon 
the  grand  stairways  of  the  palace.  The  Swiss  stood  "steadfast  "as 
the  granite  of  their  Alps."  But  they  were  overwhelmed  at  last, 
and  all  were  murdered,  either  in  the  building  itself  or  in  the 
surrounding  courts  and  streets. 

The  Massacre  of  September  ("  Jail  Delivery  ").  — The  army  of 
the  allies  hurried  on  towards  Paris  to  avenge  the  slaughter  of  the 
royal  guards  and  to  rescue  the  king.  The  capital  was  all  excite- 
ment. "  We  must  stop  the  enemy,"  cried  Danton,  "  by  striking 
terror  into  the  royalists."  To  this  end  the  most  atrocious  meas- 
ures were  now  adopted  by  the  Extremists.    It  was  resolved  that  all 


THE  NATIONAL    CONVENTION  657 

the  royalists  confined  in  the  jails  of  the  capital  should  be  mur- 
dered. A  hundred  or  more  assassins  were  hired  to  butcher  the 
prisoners.  The  murderers  first  entered  the  churches  of  the  city, 
and  the  unfortunate  priests  who  had  refused  to  take  oath  to 
support  the  new  constitution,  were  butchered  in  heaps  about  the 
altars.  The  jails  were  next  visited,  one  after  another,  the  persons 
confined  within  slaughtered,  and  their  bodies  thrown  out  to  the  bru- 
tal hordes  that  followed  the  butchers  to  enjoy  the  carnival  of  blood. 

The  victims  of  this  terrible  "September  Massacre,"  as  it  is 
called,  are  estimated  at  from  six  to  fourteen  thousand.  Europe 
had  never  before  known  such  a  "  jail  delivery."  It  was  the  greatest 
crime  of  the  French  Revolution. 

Defeat  of  the  Allies.  —  Meanwhile,  in  the  open  field,  the  fortunes 
of  war  inclined  to  the  side  of  the  revolutionists.  The  French  gen- 
erals were  successful  in  checking  the  advance  of  the  allies,  and 
finally  at  Valmy  (Sept.  20,  1792)  succeeded  in  inflicting  upon  them 
a  decisive  defeat,  which  caused  their  hasty  retreat  beyond  the  fron- 
tiers of  France.  The  day  after  this  victory  the  Legislative  Assem- 
bly came  to  an  end,  and  the  following  day  the  National  Convention 
assembled. 

4.  The  National  Convention  (Sept.  21,  1792-Oct.  26,  1795). 

Parties  in  the  Convention. — The  Convention,  consisting  of 
seven  hundred  and  forty-nine  deputies,  among  whom  was  the 
celebrated  freethinker,  Tom  Paine,  was  divided  into  two  parties, 
the  Girondists  and  the  Mountainists.  There  were  no  monarchists  ; 
all  were  republicans.     No  one  dared  to  speak  of  a  monarchy. 

The  Establishment  of  the  Republic  (Sept.  21,  1792).— The 
very  first  act  of  the  Convention  on  its  opening  day  was  to  abolish 
the  Monarchy  and  proclaim  France  a  Republic.  The  motion  for 
the  abolition  of  Royalty  was  not  even  discussed.  "  What  need  is 
there  for  discussion,"  exclaimed  a  delegate,  "  where  all  are  agreed  ? 
Courts  are  the  hot-bed  of  crime,  the  focus  of  corruption  ;  the  his- 
tory of  kings  is  the  martyrology  of  nations." 

All  titles  of  nobility  were  also  aljolished.     Every  one  was  to  be 


658  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

addressed  simply  as  citizen.  In  the  debates  of  the  Convention, 
the  king  was  alluded  to  as  Citizen  Capet,  and  on  the  street  the 
shoeblack  was  called  Citizen  Shoeblack. 

The  day  following  the  Proclamation  of  the  republic  (Sept.  22, 
1792)  was  made  the  beginning  of  a  new  era,  the  first  day  of  the 
Year  I.  That  was  to  be  regarded  as  the  natal  day  of  Liberty.  A 
little  later,  excited  by  the  success  of  the  French  armies,  —  the  Aus- 
trians  and  Prussians  had  been  beaten,  and  Belgium  had  been  over- 
run and  occupied,  —  the  Convention  called  upon  all  nations  to  rise 
against  despotism,  and  pledged  the  aid  of  France  to  any  people 
wishing  to  secure  freedom. 

Trial  and  Execution  of  the  King  (Jan.  21,  1793).  —  The  next 
work  of  the  Convention  was  the  trial  and  execution  of  the  king. 
On  the  nth  of  December,  1792,  he  was  brought  before  the  bar 
of  that  body,  charged  with  having  conspired  with  the  enemies  of 
France,  of  having  opposed  the  will  of  the  people,  and  of  hav- 
ing caused  the  massacre  of  the  10th  of  August.  The  sentence  of 
the  Convention  was  immediate  death.  On  Jan.  21,  1793,  tne 
unfortunate  monarch  was  conducted  to  the  scaffold. 

Coalition  against  France.  —  The  regicide  awakened  the  most 
bitter  hostility  against  the  French  revolutionists,  among  all  the 
old  monarchies  of  Europe.  The  act  was  interpreted  as  a  threat 
against  all  kings.  A  grand  coalition,  embracing  Prussia,  Austria, 
England,  Sweden,  Holland,  Spain,  Portugal,  Piedmont,  Naples, 
the  Holy  See,  and  later,  Russia,  was  formed  to  crush  the  republi- 
can movement.  Armies  aggregating  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  mil- 
lion of  men  threatened  France  at  once  on  every  frontier. 

While*  thus  beset  with  foes  without,  the  republic  was  threatened 
with  even  more  dangerous  enemies  within.  The  people  of  La 
Vendue,  in  Western  France,  who  still  retained  their  simple  rever- 
ence for  Royalty,  Nobility,  and  the  Church,  rose  in  revolt  against 
the  sweeping  innovations  of  the  revolutionists. 

To  meet  all  these  dangers  which  threatened  the  life  of  the 
new-born  republic,  the  Convention  ordered  a  levy,  which  placed 
300,000  men  in  the  field.  The  stirring  Marseillaise  Hymn,  sung 
by  the  marching  bands,  awakened  everywhere  a  martial  fervor. 


FALL    OF  THE   GLRONDLSTS.  659 

The  Fall  of  the  Girondists  (June  2,  1793).  —  Gloomy  tidings 
came  from  every  quarter,  —  news  of  reverses  to  the  armies  of  the 
republic  in  front  of  the  allies,  and  of  successes  of  the  counter- 
revolutionists  in  La  Vendue  and  other  provinces.  The  Mountain- 
ists  in  the  Convention,  supported  by  the  rabble  of  Paris,  urged  the 
most  extreme  measures.  They  proposed  that  the  carriages  of  the 
wealthy  should  be  seized  and  used  for  carrying  soldiers  to  the  seat 
of  war,  and  that  the  expenses  of  the  government  should  be  met 
by  forced  contributions  from  the  rich. 

The  Girondists  opposing  these  communistic  measures,  a  mob, 
80,000  strong,  it  is  asserted,  surrounded  the  Convention,  and  de- 
manded that  the  Girondists  be  given  up  as  enemies  of  the  Republic. 
They  were  surrendered  and  placed  under  arrest,  a  preliminary  step 
to  the  speedy  execution  of  many  of  them  during  the  opening  days 
of  the  Reign  of  Terror,  which  had  now  begun. 

Thus  did  the  Parisian  mob  purge  the  National  Convention  of 
France,  as  the  army  purged  Parliament  in  the  English  Revolution 
(see  p.  612).  That  mob  were  now  masters,  not  only  of  the 
capital,  but  of  France  as  well.  There  is  nothing  before  France 
now  but  anarchy,  and  the  dictator  to  whom  anarchy  always  gives 
birth. 

The  Reign  of  Terror  (June  2,  1793-July  27,  1794). 

Opening  of  the  Reign  of  Terror.  —  As  soon  as  the  expulsion  of 
the  Moderates  had  given  the  Extremists  control  of  the  Convention, 
they  proceeded  to  carry  out  their  policy  of  terrorism.  Supreme 
power  was  vested  in  the  so-called  Committee  of  Public  Safety, 
which  became  a  terrific  engine  of  tyranny  and  cruelty.  Marat 
was  president  of  the  Committee,  and  Danton  and  Robespierre 
were  both  members. 

The  scenes  which  now  followed  are  only  feebly  illustrated  by 
the  proscriptions  of  Sulla  in  ancient  Rome  (see  p.  283).  All 
aristocrats,  all  persons  suspected  of  lukewarmness  in  the  cause  of 
liberty,  were  ordered  to  the  guillotine.  Hundreds  were  murdered 
simply  because  their  wealth  was  wanted.     Others  fell,  not  because 


660  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

they  were  guilty  of  any  political  offence,  but  on  account  of  having 
in  some  way  incurred  the  personal  displeasure  of  the  dictators. 

Charlotte  Corday:  Assassination  of  Marat  (July  13, 1793). — 
At  this  moment  appeared  the  Joan  of  Arc  of  the  Revolution.  A 
maiden  of  Normandy,  Charlotte  Corday  by  name,  conceived  the 
idea  of  delivering  France  from  the  terrors  of  proscription  and  civil 
war,  by  going  to  Paris  and  killing  Marat,  whom  she  regarded  as 
the  head  of  the  tyranny.  On  pretence  of  wishing  to  reveal  to  him 
something  of  importance,  she  gained  admission  to  his  rooms  and 
stabbed  him  to  the  heart.  She  atoned  for  the  deed  under  the 
knife  of  the  guillotine. 

Events  after  the  Death  of  Marat.  —  The  enthusiasm  of  Char- 
lotte Corday  had  led  her  to  believe  that  the  death  of  Marat  would 
be  a  fatal  blow  to  the  power  of  the  Mountainists.  But  it  only 
served  to  drive  them  to  still  greater  excesses,  under  the  lead  of 
Danton  and  Robespierre.  She  died  to  stanch  the  flow  of  her 
country's  blood;  but,  as  Lamartine  says,  "her  poniard  appeared 
to  have  opened  the  veins  of  France."  The  flame  of  insurrection 
in  the  departments  was  quenched  in  deluges  of  blood.  Some  of 
the  cities  that  had  been  prominent  centres  of  the  counter-revolu- 
tion were  made  a  terrible  example  of  the  vengeance  of  the  revolu- 
tionists. Lyons  was  an  object  of  special  hatred  to  the  tyrants. 
Respecting  this  place  the  Convention  passed  the  following  de- 
cree :  "  The  city  of  Lyons  shall  be  destroyed  :  every  house  occupied 
by  a  rich  man  shall  be  demolished;  only  the  dwellings  of  the 
poor  shall  remain,  with  edifices  specially  devoted  to  industry,  and 
monuments  consecrated  to  humanity  and  public  education."  So 
thousands  of  men  were  set  to  work  to  pull  down  the  city.  The 
Convention  further  decreed  that  a  monument  should  be  erected 
upon  the  ruins  of  Lyons  with  this  inscription :  "  Lyons  opposed 
Liberty  !  Lyons  is  no  more  !  " 

Execution  of  the  Queen  and  of  the  Girondists.  —  The  rage  of 
the  revolutionists  was  at  this  moment  turned  anew  against  the 
remaining  members  of  the  royal  family,  by  the  European  powers 
proclaiming  the  Dauphin  King  of  France.     The  queen,  who  had 


SWEEPING   CHANGES.  661 

now  borne  nine  months'  imprisonment  in  a  close  dungeon,  was 
brought  before  the  terrible  Revolutionary  Tribunal,  a  sort  of  court 
organized  to  take  cognizance  of  conspiracies  against  the  republic, 
condemned  to  the  guillotine,  and  straightway  beheaded. 

Two  weeks  after  the  execution  of  the  queen,  twenty-one  of  the 
chiefs  of  the  Girondists,  who  had  been  kept  in  confinement  since 
their  arrest  in  the  Convention,  were  pushed  beneath  the  knife. 
Hundreds  of  others  followed.  Day  after  day  the  carnival  of  death 
went  on.  Seats  were  arranged  for  the  people,  who  crowded  to  the 
spectacle  as  to  a  theatre.  The  women  busied  their  hands  with 
their  knitting,  while  their  eyes  feasted  upon  the  swiftly  changing 
scenes  of  the  horrid  drama. 

Most  illustrious  of  all  the  victims  after  the  queen  was  Madame 
Roland,  who  was  accused  of  being  the  friend  of  the  Girondists. 
W<  mian  has  always  acted  a  prominent  part  in  the  great  events  of 
French  history,  because  the  grand  ideas  and  sentiments  which  have 
worked  so  powerfully  upon  the  imaginative  and  impulsive  tempera- 
ment of  the  men  of  France,  have  appealed  with  a  still  more  fatal 
attraction  to  her  more  romantic  and  generously  enthusiastic  nature. 

Sweeping  Changes  and  Reforms.  —  While  clearing  away  the 
enemies  of  France  and  of  liberty,  the  revolutionists  were  also  busy 
making  the  most  sweeping  changes  in  the  ancient  institutions  and 
customs  of  the  land.  They  hated  these  as  having  been  established 
by  kings  and  aristocrats  to  enhance  their  own  importance  and 
power,  and  to  enthrall  the  masses.  They  proposed  to  sweep  these 
things  all  aside,  and  give  the  world  a  fresh  start. 

A  new  system  of  weights  and  measures,  known  as  the  metrical, 
was  planned,  and  a  new  mode  of  reckoning  time  was  introduced. 
The  names  of  the  months  were  altered,  titles  being  given  them  ex- 
pressive of  the  character  of  each.  Each  month  was  divided  into 
three  periods  of  ten  days  each,  called  decades,  and  each  day  into 
ten  parts.  The  tenth  day  of  each  decade  took  the  place  of  Sun- 
day. The  five  odd  days  not  provided  for  in  the  arrangement  were 
made  festival  days. 

Abolition  of  Christianity.  —  With  these  reforms  effected,  the 


662 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 


revolutionists  next  proceeded  to  the  more  difficult  task  of  subvert- 
ing the  ancient  institutions  of  religion.  Some  of  the  chiefs  of  the 
Commune  of  Paris  declared  that  the  Revolution  should  not  rest 
until  it  had  "  dethroned  the  King  of  Heaven  as  well  as  the  kings 
of  earth." 

An  attempt  was  made  by  the  Extremists  to  have  Christianity 
abolished  by  a  decree  of  the  National  Convention ;  but  that  body, 
fearing  such  an  act  might  alienate  many  who  were  still  attached  to 
the  Church,  resolved  that  all  matters  of  creed 
should  be  left  to  the  decision  of  the  people 
themselves. 

The  atheistic  chiefs  of  the  Commune  of 
the  capital  now  determined  to  effect  their 
purpose  through  the  Church  itself.  They 
persuaded  the  Bishop  of  Paris  to  abdicate  his 
office ;  and  his  example  was  followed  by 
many  of  the  clergy  throughout  the  country. 
The  churches  of  Paris  and  of  other  cities 
were  now  closed,  and  the  treasures  of  their 
altars  and  shrines  confiscated  to  the  State. 
Even  the  bells  were  melted  down  into  can- 
non. The  images  of  the  Virgin  and  of  the 
Christ  were  torn  down,  and  the  busts  of 
Marat  and  other  patriots  set  up  in  their 
stead.  And  as  the  emancipation  of  the 
world  was  now  to  be  wrought,  not  by  the 
Cross,  but  by  the  guillotine,  that  instrument 
took  the  place  of  the  crucifix,  and  was  called  the  Holy  Guillotine. 
All  the  visible  symbols  of  the  ancient  religion  were  destroyed.  All 
emblems  of  hope  in  the  cemeteries  were  obliterated,  and  over 
their  gates  were  inscribed  the  words,  "  Death  is  eternal  sleep." 

The  madness  of  the  Parisian  people  culminated  in  the  worship 
of  what  was  called  the  Goddess  of  Reason.  A  celebrated  beauty, 
personating  the  Goddess,  was  set  upon  the  altar  of  Notre  Dame  as 
the  object  of  homage  and  adoration.     The  example  of  Paris  was 


\.i 


P 


w 


wn 


Q! 


THE  GUILLOTINE. 


FALL    OF  HEBERT  AND  DAN  TON.  663 

followed  in  many  places  throughout  France.  Churches  were  every- 
where converted  into  temples  of  the  new  worship.  The  Sabbath 
having  been  abolished,  the  services  of  the  temple  were  held  only 
upon  every  tenth  day.  On  that  day  the  mayor  or  some  popular 
leader  mounted  the  altar  and  harangued  the  people,  dwelling  upon 
the  news  of  the  moment,  the  triumphs  of  the  armies  of  the  repub- 
lic, the  glorious  achievements  of  the  Revolution,  and  the  privilege 
of  living  in  an  era  when  one  was  oppressed  neither  by  kings  on 
earth  or  by  a  King  in  heaven. 

Fall  of  Hebert  and  Danton  (March  and  April,  1794).  —  Not 
quite  one  year  of  the  Reign  of  Terror  had  passed  before  the  rev- 
olutionists, having  destroyed  or  driven  into  obscurity  their  common 
enemy,  the  Girondists,  turned  upon  one  another  with  the  ferocity 
of  beasts  whose  appetites  has  been  whetted  by  the  taste  of  blood. 

During  the  progress  of  events  the  Jacobins  had  become  divided 
into  three  factions,  headed  respectively  by  Danton,  Robespierre, 
and  Hubert.  Danton,  though  he  had  been  a  bold  and  audacious 
leader,  was  now  adopting  a  more  conservative  tone,  and  was  con- 
demning the  extravagances  and  cruelties  of  the  Committee  of 
Public  Safety,  of  which  he  had  ceased  to  be 
a  member. 

Hubert  was  one  of  the  worst  demagogues 
of  the  Commune,  the  chief  and  instigator 
of  the  Parisian  rabble.  He  and  his  fol- 
lowers, the  sans-culottes  of  the  capital, 
would  overturn  everything  and  refound 
society  upon  communism  and  atheism. 

Robespierre   occupied  a  position   mid- 
way between   these   two,  condemning   alike   the   moderatism  of 
Danton  and  the  atheistic  communism  of  Hebert.     To  make  his 
own  power  supreme,  he  resolved  to  crush  both. 

Hubert  and  his  party  were  the  first  to  fall,  Danton  and  his 
adherents  working  with  Robespierre  to  bring  about  their  ruin,  for 
the  Moderates  and  Anarchists  were  naturally  at  bitter  enmity. 

Danton  and  his  friends  were  the  next  to  follow.     Little  more 


664  THE   FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

than  a  week  had  passed  since  the  execution  of  Hebert  before 
Robespierre  had  effected  their  destruction,  on  the  charge  of  con- 
spiring with  and  encouraging  the  counter-revolutionists. 

With  the  Anarchists  and  Moderates  both  destroyed,  Robespierre 
was  now  supreme.  His  ambition  was  attained.  "  He  stood  alone 
on  the  awful  eminence  of  the  Holy  Mountain."  But  his  turn 
was  soon  to  come. 

Worship  of  the  Supreme  Being.  —  One  of  the  first  acts  of  the 
dictator  was  to  give  France  a  new  religion  in  place  of  the  worship 
of  Reason.  Robespierre  wished  to  sweep  away  Christianity  as  a 
superstition,  but  he  would  stop  at  deism.  He  did  not  believe 
that  a  state  could  be  founded  on  atheism.  "  Atheism,"  said  he, 
"  is  aristocratic.  The  idea  of  a  great  being  who  watches  over 
oppressed  innocence,  and  who  punishes  triumphant  guilt,  is  and 
always  will  be  popular.  If  God  did  not  exist,  it  would  behoove 
man  to  invent  him."  Accordingly  Robespierre  offered  in  the  Con- 
vention the  following  resolution  :  "  The  French  people  acknowledge 
the  existence  of  the  Supreme  Being  and  the  immortality  of  the 
soul."  The  decree  was  adopted,  and  the  churches  that  had  been 
converted  into  temples  of  the  Goddess  of  Reason  were  now  con- 
secrated to  the  worship  of  the  Supreme  Being. 

The  Terror  at  Paris.  —  At  the  very  same  time  that  Robespierre 
was  establishing  the  new  worship,  he  was  desolating  France  with 
massacres  of  incredible  atrocity,  and  ruling  by  a  terrorism  unpar- 
alleled since  the  most  frightful  days  of  Rome.  With  all  power 
gathered  in  his  hands,  he  overawed  all  opposition  and  dissent  by 
the  wholesale  slaughters  of  the  guillotine.  The  prisons  of  Paris 
and  of  the  departments  were  filled  with  suspected  persons,  until 
200,000  prisoners  were  crowded  within  these  republican  Bas- 
tiles.  At  Paris  the  dungeons  were  emptied  of  their  victims  and 
room  made  for  fresh  ones,  by  the  swift  processes,  of  the  Revolu- 
tionary Tribunal,  which  in  mockery  of  justice  caused  the  prisoners 
to  be  brought  before  its  bar  in  companies  of  ten  or  fifty.  Rank 
or  talent  was  an  inexpiable  crime.  "Were  you  not  a  noble?" 
asks  the  president  of  the  court  of  one  of  the  accused.     "Yes," 


MASS  ACMES   IN   THE   PROVINCES.  665 

was  the  reply.  "Enough  ;  another,"  was  the  judge's  verdict.  And 
so  on  through  the  long  list  each  day  brought  before  the  tribunal. 

The  scenes  about  the  guillotine  were  simply  infernal.  Benches 
were  arranged  around  the  scaffold  and  rented  to  spectators,  like 
seats  in  a  theatre.  A  special  sewer  had  to  be  constructed  to  carry 
off  the  blood  of  the  victims.  In  the  space  of  a  little  over  a 
month  (from  June  ioth  to  July  17th)  the  number  of  persons  guil- 
lotined at  Paris  was  1285,  an  average  of  34  a  day. 

Massacres  in  the  Provinces.  —  While  such  was  the  terrible  state 
of  things  at  the  capital,  matters  were  even  worse  in  many  of  the 
other  leading  cities  of  France.  The  scenes  at  Nantes,  Bordeaux, 
Marseilles,  and  Toulon  suggested,  in  their  varied  elements  of 
horror,  the  awful  conceptions  of  the  "  Inferno  "  of  Dante.  At 
Nantes  the  victims  were  at  first  shot  singly  or  guillotined ;  but 
these  methods  being  found  too  slow,  more  expeditious  modes  of 
execution  were  devised.  To  these  were  playfully  given  the  names 
of  "  Republican  Baptisms,"  "  Republican  Marriages,"  and  "  Bat- 
tues." 

The  "  Republican  Baptism  "  consisted  in  crowding  a  hundred  or 
more  persons  into  a  vessel,  which  was  then  towed  out  into  the 
Loire  and  scuttled.  In  the  "  Republican  Marriages  "  a  man  and 
woman  were  bound  together,  and  then  thrown  into  the  river.  The 
"  Battues n  consisted  in  ranging  the  victims  in  long  ranks,  and 
mowing  them  down  with  discharges  of  cannon  and  musket. 

By  these  various  methods  fifteen  thousand  victims  were  destroyed 
in  the  course  of  a  single  month.  The  entire  number  massacred  at 
Nantes  during  the  Reign  of  Terror  is  estimated  at  thirty  thousand. 
What  renders  these  murders  the  more  horrible  is  the  fact  that  a 
considerable  number  of  the  victims  were  women  and  children. 
Nantes  was  at  this  time  crowded  with  the  orphaned  children  of 
the  Vendean  counter-revolutionists.  Upon  a  single  night  three 
hundred  of  these  innocents  were  taken  from  the  city  prisons  and 
drowned  in  the  Loire. 

The  Fall  of  Robespierre  (July,  1794).  —  By  such  terrorism  did 
Robespierre  and  his  creatures  rule  France  for  a  little  more  than 


666  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

three  months.  The  awful  suspense  and  dread  drove  many  into 
insanity  and  to  suicide.  The  strain  was  too  great  for  human 
nature  to  bear.  A  reaction  came.  The  successes  of  the  armies 
of  the  republic,  and  the  establishment  of  the  authority  of  the 
Convention  throughout  the  departments,  caused  the  people  to 
look  upon  the  massacres  that  were  daily  taking  place  as  unneces- 
sary and  cruel.  They  began  to  turn  with  horror  and  pity  from  the 
scenes  of  the  guillotine. 

The  first  blow  at  the  power  of  the  dictator  was  struck  in  the 
Convention.  A  member  dared  to  denounce  him,  upon  the  floor 
of  the  assembly,  as  a  tyrant.  The  spell  was  broken.  He  was 
arrested  and  sent  to  the  guillotine,  with  a  large  number  of  his 
confederates.  The  people  greeted  the  fall  of  the  tyrant's  head 
with  demonstrations  of  unbounded  joy.  The  delirium  was  over. 
"  France  had  awakened  from  the  ghastly  dream  of  the  Reign  of 
Terror  (July  28,  1794)." 

The  Reaction.  —  The  reaction  which  had  swept  away  Robes- 
pierre and  his  associates  continued  after  their  ruin.  The  clubs  of 
the  Jacobins  were  closed,  and  that  infamous  society  which  had 
rallied  and  directed  the  hideous  rabbles  of  the  great  cities  was 
broken  up.  The  deputies  that  had  been  driven  from  their  seats 
in  the  Convention  were  invited  to  resume  their  places  and  the 
Christian  worship  was  reestablished. 

Napoleon  defends  the  Convention  (Oct.  5,  1795).  —  These  and 
other  measures  of  the  Convention  did  not  fail  of  arousing  the 
bitter  opposition  of  the  scattered  forces  of  the  Terrorists,  as  they 
were  called;  and  on  the  5th  of  October,  1795,  a  mob  of  40,000 
men  advanced  to  the  attack  of  the  Tuileries,  where  the  Conven- 
tion was  sitting.  As  the  mob  came  on  they  were  met  by  a  storm 
of  grape  shot,  which  sent  them  flying  back  in  wild  disorder.  The 
man  who  trained  the  guns  was  a  young  artillery  officer,  a  native 
of  the  island  of  Corsica,  —  Napoleon  Bonaparte.  The  Revolu- 
tion had  at  last  brought  forth  a  man  of  genius  capable  of  control- 
ling and  directing  its  tremendous  energies. 


THE  DIRECTORY.  667 

5.   The  Directory  (Oct.  27,  1795-Nov.  9,  1799). 

The  Republic  becomes  Aggressive.  —  A  few  weeks  after  the 
defence  of  the  Convention  by  Napoleon,  that  body  declaring  its 
labors  ended,  closed  its  sessions,  and  immediately  afterwards  the 
Councils  and  the  Board  of  Directors  provided  for  by  the  new  con- 
stitution ■  that  had  been  framed  by  the  Convention,  assumed  con- 
trol of  affairs. 

Under  the  Directory  the  republic,  which  up  to  this  time  had 
been  acting  mainly  on  the  defensive,  entered  upon  an  aggressive 
policy.  The  Revolution,  having  accomplished  its  work  in  France, 
having  there  destroyed  royal  despotism  and  abolished  class  privi- 
lege, now  set  itself  about  fulfilling  its  early  promise  of  giving  lib- 
erty to  all  peoples  (see  p.  658).  In  a  word,  the  revolutionists 
became  propagandists.  France  now  exhibits  what  her  historians 
call  her  social,  her  communicative  genius.  "  Easily  seduced  her- 
self," as  Lamartine  says,  "  she  easily  seduces  others."  She  would 
make  all  Europe  like  unto  herself.  Herself  a  republic,  she  would 
make  all  nations  republics. 

Had  not  the  minds  of  the  people  in  all  the  neighboring  coun- 
tries been  prepared  to  welcome  the  new  order  of  things,  the  Revo- 
lution could  never  have  spread  itself  as  widely  as  it  did.  But 
everywhere  irrepressible  longings  for  social  and  political  equality 
and  freedom,  born  of  long  oppression,  were  stirring  the  souls  of 
men.  The  French  armies  were  everywhere  welcomed  as  deliver- 
ers. Thus  was  France  enabled  to  surround  herself  with  a  girdle 
of  commonwealths.  She  conquered  Europe  not  by  her  armies, 
but  by  her  ideas.  "  An  invasion  of  armies,"  says  Victor  Hugo, 
"  can  be  resisted  :  an  invasion  of  ideas  cannot  be  resisted." 

The  republics  established  were,  indeed,  short-lived ;  for  the 
times  were  not  yet  ripe  for  the  complete  triumph  of  democratic 

1  There  were  to  be  two  legislative  bodies,  —  the  Council  of  Five  Hundred 
and  the  Council  of  the  Ancients,  the  latter  embracing  two  hundred  and  fifty 
persons,  of  whom  no  one  could  l>e  under  fifty  years  of  age.  The  executive 
power  was  vested  in  a  board  of  five  persons,  which  was  called  the  Directory. 


668  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

ideas.  But  a  great  gain  for  freedom  was  made.  The  reestablished 
monarchies  never  dared  to  make  themselves  as  despotic  as  those 
which  the  Revolution  had  overturned. 

The  Plans  of  the  Directory.  —  Austria  and  England  were  the 
only  formidable  powers  that  still  persisted  in  their  hostility  to  the 
republic.  The  Directors  resolved  to  strike  a  decisive  blow  at  the 
first  of  these  implacable  foes.  To  carry  out  their  designs,  two 
large  armies,  numbering  about  70,000  each,  were  mustered  upon 
the  middle  Rhine,  and  intrusted  to  the  command  of  the  two  young 
and  energetic  generals  Moreau  and  Jourdan,  who  were  to  make 
a  direct  invasion  of  Germany.  A  third  army,  numbering  about 
36,000  men,  was  assembled  in  the  neighborhood  of  Nice,  in 
South-eastern  France,  and  placed  in  the  hands  of  Napoleon,  to 
whom  was  assigned  the  work  of  driving  the  Austrians  out  of  Italy. 

Napoleon's  Italian  Campaign  (1 796-1 797).  —  Straightway  upon 
receiving  his  command,  Napoleon,  now  in  his  twenty-seventh  year, 
animated  by  visions  of  military  glory  to  be  gathered  on  the  fields 
of  Italy,  hastened  to  join  his  army  at  Nice.  He  found  the  discon- 
tented soldiers  almost  without  food  or  clothes.  He  at  once  aroused 
all  their  latent  enthusiasm  by  one  of  those  short,  stirring  addresses 
for  which  he  afterwards  became  so  famous.  Then  before  the 
mountain  roads  were  yet  free  from  snow,  he  set  his  army  in 
motion,  and  forced  the  passage  of  the  low  Genoese,  or  Mari- 
time Alps.  The  Carthaginian  had  been  surpassed.  "  Hanni- 
bal," exclaimed  Napoleon,  "crossed  the  Alps;  as  for  us,  we  have 
turned  them."  Now  followed  a  most  astonishing  series  of  French 
victories  over  the  Austrians  and  their  allies.  As  a  result  of  the 
campaign  a  considerable  part  of  Northern  Italy  was  formed  into 
a  commonwealth  under  the  name  of  the  Cisalpine  Republic. 
Genoa  was  also  transformed  into  the  Ligurian  Republic. 

Treaty  of  Campo  Formio  (1797).  —  While  Napoleon  had  been 
gaining  his  surprising  victories  in  Italy,  Moreau  and  Jourdan  had 
been  meeting  with  severe  reverses  in  Germany,  their  invading 
columns  having  been  forced  back  upon  the  Rhine  by  the  Arch- 
duke Charles.     Napoleon,  having  effected  the  work   assigned  to 


NAPOLEON'S  EGYPTIAN  CAMPAIGN.  669 

the  army  of  Italy,  now  climbed  the  Eastern  Alps,  and  led  his  soldiers 
down  upon  the  plains  of  Austria.  The  near  approach  of  the  French 
to  Vienna  induced  the  emperor,  Francis  II.,  to  listen  to  propo- 
sals of  peace.  An  armistice  was  agreed  upon,  and  a  few  months 
afterwards  the  important  treaty  of  Campo  Formio  was  arranged. 
By  the  terms  of  this  treaty  Austria  ceded  her  Belgian  provinces  to 
the  French  Republic,  surrendered  important  provinces  on  the  west 
side  of  the  Rhine,  and  acknowledged  the  Cisalpine  Republic. 

With  the  treaty  arranged,  Napoleon  set  out  for  Paris,  where  a 
triumph  and  ovation  such  as  Europe  had  not  seen  since  the  days 
of  the  old  Roman  conquerors,  awaited  him. 

Napoleon's  Campaign  in  Egypt  (i  798-1 799). — The  Directors 
had  received  Napoleon  with  apparent  enthusiasm  and  affection ; 
but  at  this  very  moment  they  were  disquieted  by  fears  lest  the 
conqueror's  ambition  might  lead  him  to  play  the  part  of  a  second 
Caesar.  They  resolved  to  engage  the  young  commander  in  an 
enterprise  which  would  take  him  out  of  France.  This  undertak- 
ing was  an  attack  upon  England,  which  they  were  then  meditating. 
Bonaparte  opposed  the  plan  of  a  direct  descent  upon  the  island  as 
impracticable,  declaring  that  England  should  be  attacked  through 
her  Eastern  possessions.  He  presented  a  scheme  very  charac- 
teristic of  his  bold,  imaginative  genius.  This  was  nothing  less 
than  the  conquest  and  colonization  of  Egypt,  by  which  means 
France  would  be  able  to  control  the  trade  of  the  East,  and  cut 
England  off  from  her  East  India  possessions.  The  Directors  as- 
sented to  the  plan,  and  with  feelings  of  relief  saw  Napoleon  embark 
from  the  port  of  Toulon  to  carry  out  the  enterprise. 

Escaping  the  vigilance  of  the  British  fleet  that  was  patrolling  the 
Mediterranean,  Napoleon  landed  in  Egypt  July  1,  1798.  Within 
sight  of  the  Pyramids,  the  French  army  was  checked  in  its 
march  upon  Cairo  by  a  determined  stand  of  the  renowned  Mam- 
eluke cavalry.  Napoleon  animated  the  spirits  of  his  men  for 
the  inevitable  fight  by  one  of  his  happiest  speeches.  One  of  the 
nces  is  memorable:  "Soldiers,"  he  exclaimed,  pointing  to 
the  Pyramids,  "  forty  centuries  are  looking  down  upon  you."     The 


670  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

terrific  struggle  that  followed  is  known  in  history  as  the  "  Battle 
of  the  Pyramids."  Napoleon  gained  a  victory  that  opened  the 
way  for  his  advance.  The  French  now  entered  Cairo  in  triumph, 
and  all  Lower  Egypt  fell  into  their  hands. 

Napoleon  had  barely  made  his  entrance  into,,  Cairo,  before  the 
startling  intelligence  was  borne  to  him  that  his  fleet  had  been 
destroyed  in  the  bay  of  Aboukir,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Nile,  by  the 
English  admiral  Nelson  (Aug.  i,  1798). 

In  the  spring  of  1799,  Napoleon  led  his  army  into  Syria,  the 
Porte  having  joined  a  new  coalition  against  France.  He  captured 
Gaza  and  Jaffa,  and  finally  invested  Acre.  The  Turks  were 
assisted  in  the  defence  of  this  place  by  the  distinguished  English 
admiral,  Sir  Sidney  Smith.1  All  of  Napoleon's  attempts  to  carry 
the  place  by  storm  were  defeated  by  the  skill  and  bravery  of  the 
English  commander.  "That  man  Sidney,"  said  Napoleon  after- 
wards, "made  me  miss  my  destiny."  Doubtless  Napoleon's  vis- 
ion of  conquests  in  the  East  embraced  Persia  and  India.  With 
the  ports  of  Syria  secured,  he  would  have  imitated  Alexander, 
and  led  his  soldiers  to  the  foot  of  the  Himalayas. 

Bitterly  disappointed,  Napoleon  abandoned  the  siege  of  Acre, 
and  led  his  army  back  into  Egypt.  There  his  worn  and  thinned 
ranks  were  attacked  near  Aboukir  by  a  fresh  Turkish  army,  but  the 
genius  of  Napoleon  turned  threatened  defeat  into  a  brilliant  vic- 
tory. The  enthusiastic  Kleber,  one  of  Napoleon's  lieutenants, 
clasping  his  general  in  his  arms,  exclaimed,  "  Sire,  your  greatness  is 
like  that  of  the  universe." 

Establishment  of  the  Tiberine,  Helvetic,  and  Parthenopaean 
Republics. — We  must  turn  now  to  view  affairs  in  Europe.  The 
year  1 798  was  a  favorable  one  for  the  republican  cause  repre- 
sented by  the  Revolution.  During  that  year  and  the  opening 
month  of  the  following  one,  the  French  set  up  three  new  repub- 
lics.    First,  they  incited  an  insurrection  at  Rome,  made  a  prisoner 

1  The  besieged  were  further  assisted  by  a  Turkish  army  outside.  With 
these  the  French  fought  the  noted  Battle  of  Mount  Tabor,  in  which  they 
gained  a  complete  victory. 


THE  REACTION.  671 

of  the  Pope,  and  proclaimed  the  Roman,  or  Tiberine,  Republic. 
Then  they  invaded  the  Swiss  cantons  and  united  them  into  a  com- 
monwealth under  the  name  of  the  Helvetic  Republic.  A  little 
later  the  French  troops  drove  the  king  of  Naples  out  of  his  king- 
dom, and  transformed  that  state  into  the  Parthenopaean  Republic. 
Thus  were  three  new  republics  added  to  the  commonwealths 
which  the  Revolution  had  already  created. 

The  Reaction:  Napoleon  overthrows  the  Directory  (18th  and 
19th  Brumaire).  —  Most  of  this  work  was  quickly  undone.  En- 
couraged by  the  victory  of  Nelson  over  the  French  fleet  in  the 
battle  of  the  Nile,  the  leading  states  of  Europe  had  formed  a  new 
coalition  against  the  French  Republic.  Early  in  1779  the  war 
began,  and  was  waged  in  almost  every  part  of  Europe  at  the  same 
time.  The  campaign  was  on  the  whole  extremely  disastrous  to 
the  French.  They  were  driven  out  of  Italy,  and  were  barely  able 
to  keep  the  allies  off  the  soil  of  France.  The  Tiberine  and  the 
Parthenopaean  Republics  were  abolished. 

The  reverses  suffered  by  the  French  armies  caused  the  Direc- 
tory to  fall  into  great  disfavor.  They  were  charged  with  having 
through  jealousy  exiled  Napoleon,  the  only  man  who  could  save 
the  Republic.  Confusion  and  division  prevailed  everywhere.  The 
royalists  had  become  so  strong  and  bold  that  there  was  danger  lest 
they  should  gain  control  of  the  government.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  threats  of  the  Jacobins  began  to  create  apprehensions  of  an- 
other Reign  of  Terror. 

News  of  the  desperate  state  of  affairs  at  home  reached  Napoleon 
just  after  his  victory  in  Egypt,  following  his  return  from  Syria. 
He  instantly  formed  a  bold  resolve.  Confiding  the  command  of 
the  army  in  Egypt  to  Kleber,  he  set  sail  for  France,  disclosing  his 
designs  in  the  significant  words,  "The  reign  of  the  lawyers  is 
over." 

Napoleon  was  welcomed  in  France  with  the  wildest  enthusiasm. 
A  great  majority  of  the  people  felt  instinctively  that  the  emer- 
gency demanded  a  dictator.  Some  of  the  Directors  joined  with 
Napoleon  in  a  plot  to  overthrow  the  government.     Meeting  with 


672  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

opposition  in  the  Council  of  Five  Hundred,  Napoleon  with  a  body 
of  grenadiers  drove  the  deputies  from  their  chamber  (Nov.  9, 

J799)- 

The  French  Revolution  had  at  last  brought  forth  its  Cromwell 
(see  p.  611).  Napoleon  was  master  of  France.  The  first  French 
Republic  was  at  an  end,  and  what  is  distinctively  called  the 
French  Revolution  was  over.  Now  commences  the  history  of  the 
Consulate  and  the  First  Empire,  —  the  story  of  that  surprising 
career,  the  sun  of  which  rose  so  brightly  at  Austerlitz  and  set 
forever  at  Waterloo. 


THE    VEILED  MILITARY  DESPOTISM.  673 


CHAPTER    LIX. 

THE  CONSULATE  AND  THE  FIRST  EMPIRE:    FRANCE  SINCE 
THE  SECOND   RESTORATION. 

i.  The  Consulate  and  the  Empire  (i  799-1815). 

The  Veiled  Military  Despotism.  —  After  the  overthrow  of  the 
Directorial  government,  a  new  constitution  —  the  fourth  since  the 
year  1789  —  was  prepared,  and  having  been  submitted  to  the 
approval  of  the  people,  was  heartily  indorsed.  This  new  instru- 
ment vested  the  executive  power  in  three  consuls,  elected  for  a 
term  of  ten  years,  the  first  of  whom  really  exercised  all  the  author- 
ity of  the  Board.     Napoleon,  of  course,  became  the  First  Consul. 

The  other  functions  of  the  government  were  carried  on  by  a 
Council  of  State,  a  Tribunate,  a  Legislature,  and  a  Senate.  But 
the  members  of  all  these  bodies  were  appointed  either  directly  or 
indirectly  by  the  consuls,  so  that  the  entire  government  was  actu- 
ally in  their  hands,  or,  rather,  in  the  hands  of  the  First  Consul. 
France  was  still  called  a  republic,  but  it  was  such  a  republic  as 
Rome  was  under  Julius  Caesar  or  Augustus.  The  republican 
names  and  forms  merely  veiled  a  government  as  absolute  and  per- 
sonal as  that  of  Louis  XIV.,  —  in  a  word,  a  military  despotism. 

Wars  of  the  First  Consul.  —  Neither  Austria  nor  England 
would  acknowledge  the  government  of  the  First  Consul  as  legiti- 
mate. In  their  view  he  was  simply  an  upstart,  a  fortunate  usurper. 
%The  throne  of  France  belonged,  by  virtue  of  divine  right,  to  the 
House  of  Bourbon. 

Napoleon  mustered  his  soldiers.  His  plan  was  to  deal  Austria, 
his  worst  continental  enemy,  a  double  blow.  A  large  army  was 
collected  on  the  Rhine,  for  an  invasion  of  Germany.  This  was 
intrusted  to  Moreau.     Another,  intended  to  operate  against  the 


674  THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

Austrians  in  Italy,  was  gathered  at  the  foot  of  the  Alps.     Napo- 
leon himself  assumed  command  of  this  latter  force. 

In  the  spring  of  the  year  1800  Napoleon  made  his  memorable 
passage  of  the  Alps,  and  astonished  the  Austrian  generals  by  sud- 
denly appearing,  with  an  army  of  40,000  men,  on  the  plains  of 
Italy.  Upon  the  renowned  field  of  Marengo  the  Austrian  army, 
which  outnumbered  that  of  the  French  three  to  one,  was  com- 
pletely overwhelmed,  and  Italy  lay  for  a  second  time  at  the  feet  of 
Napoleon  (June  14,  1800). 

But  at  the  moment  Italy  was  regained,  Egypt  was  lost.  On  the 
very  day  of  the  battle  of  Marengo,  Kleber,  whom  Napoleon  had 
left  in  charge  of  the  army  in  Egypt,  was  assassinated  by  a  Turkish 
fanatic,  and  shortly  afterwards  the  entire  French  force  was  obliged 
to  surrender  to  the  English. 

The  French  reverses  in  Egypt,  however,  were  soon  made  up 
by  fresh  victories  in  Europe.  A  few  months  after  the  battle  of 
Marengo,  Moreau  gained  a  decisive  victory  over  the  Austrians  at 
Hohenlinden,  which  opened  the  way  to  Vienna.  The  Emperor 
Francis  II.  was  now  constrained  to  sign  a  treaty  of  peace  at  Lun£- 
ville,  in  which  he  allowed  the  Rhine  to  be  made  the  eastern  fron- 
tier of  France  (February,  1801).  The  emperor  also  recognized 
the  Cisalpine,  Ligurian,  Helvetian,  and  Batavian  republics.  The 
following  year  England  was  also  glad  to  sign  a  peace  at  Amiens 
(March,  1802). 

His  Works  of  Peace :  the  Code  Napoleon.  —  Having  wrung  from 
both  England  and  Austria  an  acknowledgment  of  his  government, 
Napoleon  was  now  free  to  devote  his  amazing  energies  to  the 
reform  and  improvement  of  the  internal  affairs  of  France.  So  at 
this  time  were  begun  by  him  those  great  works  of  various  charac- 
ter which  were  continued  through  all  the  fifteen  years  of  his  su> 
premacy.  His  great  military  road  over  the  Alps  by  the  Simplon 
Pass,  surpasses  in  bold  engineering  the  most  difficult  of  the 
Roman  roads,  while  many  of  his  architectural  works  are  the  pride 
of  France  at  the  present  day. 

Taking  up  the  work  of  the  Revolution,  he  caused  the  laws  of 


NAPOLEON  MADE   CONSUL.  675 

France  to  be  revised  and  harmonized,  producing  the  celebrated 
Code  Napoleon,  a  work  that  is  not  unworthy  of  comparison  with 
the  Corpus  Juris  Civilis  of  the  Emperor  Justinian.  The  influence 
of  this  Code  upon  the  development  of  Liberalism  in  Western 
Europe  is  simply  incalculable.  It  secured  the  work  of  the  Revo- 
lution. It  swept  away  the  unequal,  iniquitous,  oppressive  customs, 
regulations,  decrees,  and  laws  that  were  an  inheritance  from  the 
feudal  ages.  It  recognized  the  equality  in  the  eye  of  the  law 
of  noble  and  peasant.  "  It  is  to-day  the  frame-work  of  law  in 
France,  Holland,  Belgium,  Western  Germany,  Switzerland,  and 
Italy."  Had  Napoleon  done  nothing  else  save  to  give  this  Code 
to  Europe,  he  would  have  conferred  an  inestimable  benefit  upon 
mankind. 

Napoleon  made  Consul  for  Life  (1802).  —  As  a  reward  for 
his  vast  services  to  France,  and  also  in  order  that  his  magnificent 
schemes  of  reform  and  improvement  might  be  pursued  without 
fear  of  interruption,  Napoleon  was  now,  by  a  vote  of  the  people, 
made  Consul  for  Life,  with  the  right  to  name  his  successor  (Au- 
gust, 1802).  Thus  he  moved  a  step  nearer  the  coveted  dignity  of 
the  Imperial  title. 

Napoleon  proclaimed  Emperor  (1804).  —  A  conspiracy  against 
the  life  of  the  First  Consul,  and  the  increased  activity  of  his  ene- 
mies, caused  the  French  people  to  resolve  to  increase  his  power, 
and  secure  his  safety  and  the  stability  of  his  government,  by 
placing  him  upon  a  throne.  A  decree  conferring  upon  him  the 
title  of  Emperor  having  been  submitted  to  the  people  for  approval 
was  ratified  by  an  almost  unanimous  vote,  less  than  three  thousand 
persons  opposing  the  measure. 

Surrounding  Republics  changed  into  Kingdoms.  —  Thus  was 
the  First  French  Republic  metamorphosed  into  an  unveiled  empire. 
We  may  be  sure  that  the  cluster  of  republics  which  during  the 
Revolution  sprang  up  around  the  great  original,  will  speedily  un- 
dergo a  like  transformation  ;  for  Napoleon  was  right  when  he  said 
that  a  revolution  in  France  is  sure  to  be  followed  by  a  revolution 
throughout  Europe.     As  France,  a  republic,  would  make  all  states 


676  THE    CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

republics,  so  France,  a  monarchy,  would  make  all  nations  monar- 
chies. Within  five  years  from  the  time  that  the  government  of 
France  assumed  an  imperial  form,  all  the  surrounding  republics 
raised  up  by  the  revolutionary  ideas  and  armies  of  France,  had 
been  transformed  into  monarchies  dependent,  upon  France,  or 
had  become  a  component  part  of  the  French  Empire.1  Thus  was 
the  political  work  of  the  Revolution  undone.  Political  liberty  was 
taken  away  j  the  people  were  not  yet  ready  for  self-government. 
Social  Equality  was  left. 

The  Wars  of  Napoleon.  —  It  will  not  be  supposed  that  the 
powers  of  Europe  were  looking  quietly  on  while  France  was  thus 
metamorphosing  herself  and  all  the  neighboring  countries.  The 
colossal  pow^r  which  the  soldier  of  fortune  was  building  up,  was 
a  menace  to  all  Europe.  The  empire  was  more  dreaded  than  the 
republic,  because  it  was  a  military  despotism,  and  as  such,  an  in- 
strument of  irresistible  power  in  the  hands  of  a  man  of  such  genius 
and  resources  as  Napoleon.  Coalition  after  coalition,  always 
headed  by  England,  —  who  had  sworn  a  Punic  hatred  to  the 
Napoleonic  empire,  —  was  formed  by  the  monarchies  of  Europe 
against  the  "usurper,"  with  the  object  of  pressing  France  back 
within  her  original  boundaries  and  setting  up  again  the  subverted 
throne  of  the  Bourbons. 

From  the  coronation  of  Napoleon  in  1804  until  his  final  down- 
fall in  1815,  the  tremendous  struggle  went  on  almost  without  inter- 
mission. It  was  the  war  of  the  giants.  Europe  was  shaken  from 
end  to  end  by  such  armies  as  the  world  had  not  seen  since  the 
days  of  Xerxes.  Napoleon,  whose  hands  were  upheld  by  a  score 
of  distinguished  marshals,  performed  the  miracles  of  genius.  His 
brilliant  achievements  still  dazzle,  while  they  amaze,  the  world. 

1  The  Cisalpine,  or  Italian  Republic,  was  changed  into  a  kingdom,  and 
Napoleon,  crowning  himself  at  Milan  with  the  iron  crown  of  the  Lombards, 
assumed  the  government  of  the  state  with  the  title  of  King  of  Italy  (May  26, 
1805).  The  Ligurian  Republic,  embracing  Genoa  and  a  portion  of  Sardinia, 
was  made  a  part  of  France,  while  the  Batavian  Republic  was  changed  into 
the  Kingdom  of  Holland,  and  given  by  Napoleon  to  his  brother  Louis  (June, 
1806). 


AUSTERLITZ.  677 

To  relate  in  detail  the  campaigns  of  Napoleon  from  Austerlitz 
to  Waterloo  would  require  the  space  of  volumes.  We  shall  simply 
indicate  in  a  few  brief  paragraphs  the  successive  steps  by  which 
he  mounted  to  the  highest  pitch  of  power  and  fame,  and  then 
trace  rapidly  the  decline  and  fall  of  his  astonishing  fortunes. 

Austerlitz  (1805)  :  End  of  the  Holy  Roman  Empire  (1806). 
—  The  year  following  his  coronation,  Napoleon  made  a  gigan- 
tic effort  to  break  the  coalition  which  England,  Russia,  Austria, 
and  Sweden  had  formed  against  him.  He  massed  an  immense 
army  at  Boulogne,  on  the  Channel,  preparatory  to  an  invasion  of 
England ;  but  the  failure  of  his  fleet  to  carry  out  its  part  of 
the  plan,  and  intelligence  of  the  approach  of  the  Austrians  and 
Russians  towards  the  Rhenish  frontier,  caused  him  suddenly  to 
transfer  his  troops  to  the  opposite  side  of  France. 

Without  waiting  for  the  attack  of  the  allies,  Napoleon  flung  his 
Grand  Army,  as  it  was  called,  across  the  Rhine,  defeated  the  Aus- 
trians in  the  battle  of  Ulm,  and  marched  in  triumph  through  Vienna 
to  the  field  of  Austerlitz  beyond,  where  he  gained  one  of  his  most 
memorable  victories  over  the  combined  armies  of  Austria  and 
Russia,  numbering  more  than  100,000  men  (Dec.  2,  1805). 

This  battle  completely  changed  the  map  of  Europe.  Austria 
was  forced  to  give  up  Venetia  and  other  provinces  about  the  head 
of  the  Adriatic,  this  territory  being  now  added  to  the  kingdom  of 
Italy.  Sixteen  of  the  German  states,  declaring  themselves  inde- 
pendent of  the  empire,  were  formed  into  a  league,  called  the  Con- 
federation of  the  Rhine,  with  Napoleon  as  Protector.  Furthermore, 
the  Emperor  Francis  II.  was  obliged  to  surrender  the  crown  of  the 
Holy  Roman  Empire,  and  thereafter  to  content  himself  with  the 
title  of  Emperor  of  Austria. 

Thus  did  the  Holy  Roman  Empire  come  to  an  end  (1806), 
after  having  maintained  an  existence,  since  its  revival  by  Otto  the 
Great,  of  more  than  eight  hundred  years.  The  Kingdom  of  Ger- 
many, which  was  created  by  the  partition  of  the  empire  of  Charle- 
magne (see  p.  408),  now  also  passed  out  of  existence,  even  in 
name. 


678  THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

Trafalgar  (Oct.  21,  1805).  —  Napoleon's  brilliant  victories  in 
Germany  were  clouded  by  an  irretrievable  disaster  to  his  fleet, 
which  occurred  only  two  days  after  the  engagement  at  Ulm. 
Lord  Nelson  having  met,  near  Cape  Trafalgar  on  the  coast  of 
Spain,  the  combined  French  and  Spanish  fleets,  —  Spain  had 
become  the  ally  of  Napoleon,  —  almost  completely  destroyed  the 
combined  armaments.  The  gallant  English  admiral  fell  at  the 
moment  of  victory.  "Thank  God,  I  have  done  my  duty,"  were 
his  last  words. 

This  decisive  battle  gave  England  the  control  of  the  sea,  and 
relieved  her  from  all  danger  of  a  French  invasion.  Even  the 
"  wet  ditch,"  as  Napoleon  was  wont  contemptuously  to  call  the 
English  Channel,  was  henceforth  an  impassable  gulf  to  his  ambi- 
tion. He  might  rule  the  continent,  but  the  sovereignty  of  the 
ocean  and  its  islands  was  denied  him. 

Jena  and  Auerstadt  (1806).  —  Prussia  was  the  state  next  after 
Austria  to  feel  the  weight  of  Napoleon's  power.  Goaded  by 
insult,  the  Prussian  king,  Frederick  William  III.,  very  imprudently 
threw  down  the  gauntlet  to  the  French  emperor.  Moving  with 
his  usual  swiftness,  Napoleon  overwhelmed  the  armies  of  Fred- 
erick in  the  battles  of  Jena  and  Auerstadt,  which  were  both 
fought  upon  the  same  day  (Oct.  14,  1806).  Thus  the  great  mili- 
tary power  consolidated  by  the  genius  of  Frederick  the  Great,  was 
crushed  and  almost  annihilated.  What  had  proved  too  great  an 
undertaking  for  the  combined  powers  of  Europe  during  the  Seven 
Years'  War,  Napoleon  had  effected  in  less  than  a  month. 

Eylau  and  Friedland  (1807).  —  The  year  following  his  victo- 
ries over  the  Prussians,  Napoleon  led  his  Grand  Army  against  the 
forces  of  the  Czar,  Alexander  I.,  who  had  entered  Prussia  with  aid 
for  King  Frederick.  A  fierce  but  indecisive  battle  at  Eylau  was 
followed,  a  little  later  in  the  same  season,  by  the  battle  of  Fried- 
land,  in  which  the  Russians  were  completely  overwhelmed  (June 
14,  1807).     The  Czar  was  forced  to  sue  for  peace. 

By  the  terms  of  the  Treaty  of  Tilsit  Prussia  was  stripped  of 
more  than  half  of  her  former  dominions,  a  part  of  which  was  made 


THE    CONTINENTAL   SYSTEM.  679 

into  a  new  state,  called  the  Kingdom  of  Westphalia,  with  Napo- 
leon's brother,  Jerome,  as  its  king,  and  added  to  the  Confed- 
eration of  the  Rhine  j  while  Prussian  Poland,  reorganized  and 
clumsily  christened  the  "  Grand  Duchy  of  Warsaw,"  was  given  to 
Saxony.  What  was  left  of  Prussia  became  virtually  a  dependency 
of  the  French  empire. 

The  Continental  System:  the  Berlin  and  Milan  Decrees. — 
While  Napoleon  was  carrying  on  his  campaigns  against  Prussia 
and  Russia,  he  was  all  the  time  meditating  vengeance  upon  Eng- 
land, his  most  uncompromising  foe,  and  the  leader  or  the  instigator 
of  the  coalitions  which  were  constantly  being  formed  for  the  over- 
throw of  his  power.  We  have  seen  how  the  destruction  of  his 
fleet  at  Trafalgar  dashed  all  his  hopes  of  ever  making  a  descent 
upon  the  British  shores.  Unable  to  reach  his  enemy  directly  with 
his  arms,  he  resolved  to  strike  her  through  her  commerce.  By  two 
celebrated  imperial  edicts,  called  from  the  cities  whence  they  were 
issued  the  Berlin  and  the  Milan  decree,  he  closed  all  the  ports  of 
the  continent  against  English  ships,  and  forbade  any  of  the  Euro- 
pean nations  from  holding  any  intercourse  with  Great  Britain,  all 
of  whose  ports  he  declared  in  a  state  of  blockade. 

So  completely  was  Europe  under  the  domination  of  Napoleon, 
that  England's  trade  was  by  these  measures  very  seriously  crippled, 
and  great  loss  and  suffering  were  inflicted  upon  her  industrial 
classes.  We  shall  have  occasion  a  little  later  to  speak  of  the  dis- 
astrous effects  of  the  system  upon  the  French  empire  itself. 

Beginning  of  the  Peninsular  Wars  ( 1 808) .  —  One  of  the  first 
consequences  of  Napoleon's  "  continental  policy  "  was  to  bring 
him  into  conflict  with  Portugal.  The  prince  regent  of  that  country 
presuming  to  open  its  ports  to  English  ships,  Napoleon  at  once 
deposed  him,  and  sent  one  of  his  marshals  to  take  possession  of 
the  kingdom.  The  entire  royal  family,  accompanied  by  many  of 
the  nobility,  fled  to  Brazil,  and  made  that  country  the  seat  of  an 
empire  which  has  endured  to  the  present  day. 

Having  thus  gained  a  foothold  in  the  Peninsula,  Napoleon  now 
resolved  to  possess  himself  of  the  whole  of  it.     Insolently  inter- 


6S0  THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

fering  in  the  affairs  of  Spain,  he  forced  the  weak-minded  Bourbon 
king  to  resign  to  him,  as  his  "dearly  beloved  friend  and  ally,"  his 
crown,  which  he  bestowed  at  once  upon  his  brother,  Joseph  Bona- 
parte (1808).  The  throne  of  Naples,  which  Joseph  had  been 
occupying,1  was  transferred  to  Murat,  Napoleon's  brother-in-law. 
Thus  did  this  audacious  man  make  and  unmake  kings,  and  give 
away  thrones  and  kingdoms. 

But  the  high-spirited  Spaniards  were  not  the  people  to  submit 
tamely  to  such  an  indignity.  The  entire  nation,  from  the  Pyrenees 
to  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  flew  to  arms.  Portugal  also  arose,  and 
England  sent  to  her  aid  a  force  under  Sir  Arthur  Wellesley,  after- 
wards Duke  of  Wellington,  and  the  hero  of  Waterloo.  The  French 
were  soon  driven  out  of  Portugal,  and  pushed  beyond  the  Ebro 
in  Spain.  Joseph  fled  in  dismay  from  his  throne,  and  Napoleon 
found  it  necessary  to  take  the  field  himself,  in  order  to  restore  the 
prestige  of  the  French  arms.  He  entered  the  Peninsula  at  the 
head  of  an  army  of  80,000  men,  and  scattering  the  Spaniards 
wherever  he  met  them,  entered  Madrid  in  triumph,  and  reseated 
his  brother  upon  the  Spanish  throne. 

Threatening  tidings  from  another  quarter  of  Europe  now  caused 
Napoleon  to  hasten  back  to  Paris. 

Second  Campaign  against  Austria  (1809).  — Taking  advantage 
of  Napoleon's  troubles  in  the  Peninsula,  Francis  I.  of  Austria, 
who  had  been  watching  for  an  opportunity  to  retrieve  the  disaster 
of  Austerlitz,  gathered  an  army  of  half  a  million  of  men,  and  de- 
clared war  against  the  French  emperor.  But  Austria  was  fated  to 
suffer  even  a  deeper  humiliation  than  she  had  already  endured. 
Napoleon  swept  across  the  Danube,  and  at  the  end  of  a  short  cam- 
paign, the  most  noted  battles  of  which  were  those  of  Eckmiihl  and 
Wagram,  Austria  was  again  at  his  feet,  and  a  second  time  he 
entered  Vienna  in  triumph.  Austria  was  now  still  farther  dismem- 
bered, large  tracts  of  her  possessions  being  ceded  directly  to 
Napoleon  or  given  to  the  various  neighboring  states  (1809). 

1  Napoleon  dethroned  the  Bourbons  in  Naples  in  1805. 


ANNEXATION   OF   THE  PAPAL   STATES.  681 

The  Papal  States  and  Holland  joined  to  the  French  Empire.— 

That  Napoleon  cared  but  little  for  the  thunders  of  the  Church  is 
shown  by  his  treatment  of  the  Pope.  Pius  VII.  opposing  his  con- 
tinental system,  the  emperor  incorporated  the  Papal  States  with 
the  French  empire  (1809).  The  Pope  thereupon  excommuni- 
cated Napoleon,  who  straightway  arrested  the  Pontiff,  dragged  him 
over  the  Alps  into  France,  and  held  him  in  captivity  for  four  years. 

The  year  following  the  annexation  of  the  Papal  States  to  the 
French  empire,  Louis  Bonaparte,  king  of  Holland,  who  disap- 
proved of  his  brother's  continental  system,  which  was  ruining  the 
trade  of  the  Dutch,  abdicated  the  crown.  Thereupon  Napoleon 
incorporated  Holland  with  France,  on  the  ground  that  it  was 
simply  "  the  sediment  of  the  French  rivers." 

Napoleon's  Second  Marriage  (1810).  —  The  year  following  his 
triumph  over  Francis  I.  of  Austria,  Napoleon  divorced  his  wife 
Josephine,  in  order  to  form  a  new  alliance,  with  Maria  Louisa, 
Archduchess  of  Austria.  The  fond  and  faithful  Josephine  bowed 
meekly  to  the  will  of  her  lord,  and  went  into  sorrowful  exile  from 
his  palace.  Napoleon's  object  in  this  matter  was  to  cover  the 
reproach  of  his  own  plebeian  birth,  by  an  alliance  with  one  of  the 
ancient  royal  families  of  Europe,  and  to  secure  the  perpetuity  of 
his  government  by  leaving  an  heir  who  might  be  the  inheritor  of 
his  throne  and  fortunes.  His  hope  seemed  realized  when,  the 
year  following  his  marriage  with  the  Archduchess,  a  son  was  born 
to  them,  who  was  given  the  title  of  "  King  of  Rome." 

Napoleon  at  the  Summit  of  his  Power  ( 181 1).  —  Napoleon  was 
now  at  the  height  of  his  marvellous  fortunes.  Marengo,  Austerlitz, 
Jena,  Friedland,  and  Wagram  were  the  successive  steps  by  which  he 
had  mounted  to  the  most  dizzy  heights  of  military  power  and  glory. 
The  empire  which  he  had  built  up  stretched  from  the  Baltic  to 
Southern  Italy,  embracing  France  proper,  Belgium,  Holland, 
Northwestern  (iermany,  Italy  west  of  the  Apennines  as  far  south 
as  Naples,  besides  large  possessions  about  the  head  of  the  Adriatic. 
On  all  sides  were  allied,  vassal,  or  dependent  states.  Several  of 
the  ancient  thrones  of  Europe  were  occupied  by  Napoleon's  rela- 


682  THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

tives  or  favorite  marshals.     He  himself  was  head  of  the  kingdom 
of  Italy,  and  Protector  of  the  Confederation  of  the  Rhine.    Aus- 
tria and  Prussia  were  completely  subject  to  his  will.     Russia  and 
Denmark  were  his  allies. 
Elements  of  Weakness  in  the   Empire.  —  But  splendid  and 

imposing  as  at  this  moment  ap- 
peared the  external  affairs  of 
Napoleon,  the  sun  of  his  fortunes, 
which  had  risen  so  brightly  at 
Austerlitz,  had  already  passed  its 
meridian.  There  were  many 
things  just  now  contributing  to 
the  weakness  of  the  French  em- 
pire and  foreboding  its  speedy 
dissolution.      Founded   and   up- 

NAPOLEON    BONAPARTE.  ,     .,   ,       U  .  c  x T         , 

held  by  the  genius  of  Napoleon, 
it  depended  solely  upon  the  life  and  fortunes  of  this  single  man. 
The  diverse  elements  it  embraced  were  as  yet  so  loosely  joined 
that  there  could  be  no  hope  or  possibility  of  its  surviving  either 
the  misfortune  or  the  death  of  its  founder. 

Again,  Napoleon's  continental  system,  through  the  suffering  and 
loss  it  inflicted  upon  all  the  maritime  countries  of  Europe,  had 
caused  murmurs  of  discontent  all  around  the  circumference  of  the 
continent.  This  ruinous  policy  had  also  involved  the  French 
emperor  in  a  terribly  wasteful  war  with  Spain,  which  country  was 
destined  —  more  truly  than  Italy,  of  which  the  expression  was 
first  used  —  to  become  "the  grave  of  the  French."  Napoleon 
after  his  downfall  himself  admitted  that  his  passage  of  the  Pyrenees 
was  the  fatal  misstep  in  his  career. 

Furthermore,  the  conscriptions  of  the  emperor  had  drained 
France  of  men,  and  her  armies  were  now  recruited  by  mere  boys, 
who  were  utterly  unfit  to  bear  the  burden  and  fatigue  of  Napoleon's 
rapid  campaigns.  The  heavy  taxes,  also,  which  were  necessary 
to  meet  the  expenses  of  Napoleon's  wars,  and  to  carry  on  the 
splendid  public  works  upon  which  he  was  constantly  engaged, 


THE  INVASION  OF  RUSSIA.  683 

produced  great  suffering  and  discontent  throughout  the  empire. 
And  the  crowd  of  deposed  princes  and  dispossessed  aristocrats 
in  those  states  where  Napoleon  had  promulgated  his  new  code  of 
equal  rights  (see  p.  675),  were  naturally  restless  and  resentful,  and 
watchful  for  an  opportunity  to  recover  their  ancient  power  and 
privileges.  Even  the  large  class  in  the  surrounding  countries  that 
at  first  welcomed  Napoleon  as  the  representative  of  the  French 
ideas  of  equality  and  liberty,  and  applauded  while  he  overturned 
ancient  thrones  and  aristocracies,  which,  like  the  monarchy  and 
the  feudal  nobility  in  France  swept  away  by  the  Revolution,  had 
become  unbearably  proud,  corrupt,  and  oppressive,  —  even  these 
early  adherents  had  been  turned  into  bitter  enemies  through 
Napoleon's  adoption  of  imperial  manners,  and  especially  by  his 
setting  aside  his  first  wife,  Josephine,  in  order  that  he  might  ally 
himself  to  one  of  the  old  royal  houses  of  Europe,  which  act  was 
looked  upon  as  a  betrayal  of  the  cause  of  the  people. 

Nothing  save  the  prestige  of  Napoleon's  name  and  the  dread  of 
his  vengeance  keeps  his  enemies  at  bay.  Let  the  lion  be  wounded 
and  a  hundred  enemies  will  spring  upon  him  from  every  side. 

The  Invasion  of  Russia  (18 12-18 13).  —  The  signal  for  the 
uprising  of  Europe  was  the  terrible  misfortune  which  befell  Napo- 
leon in  his  invasion  of  Russia.  The  Czar  having  cast  aside  the  old 
ties  of  alliance  and  friendship,  and  entered  a  coalition  against 
France,  Napoleon  crossed  the  frontiers  of  Russia,  at  the  head  of 
what  was  proudly  called  the  Grand  Army,  numbering  more  than 
half  a  million  of  men. 

The  Russians  threw  themselves  across  the  path  of  the  invaders 
at  Borodino,  but  their  lines  were  swept  back  by  the  strong  col- 
umns of  the  Grand  Army,  although  the  victory  cost  the  French 
dear.  Following  closely  the  retreating  enemy,  the  French  pushed 
on  towards  the  ancient  Russian  capital,  Moscow.  This  city  Napo- 
leon had  thought  would  supply  food  for  his  army,  and  shelter  from 
the  severity  of  the  northern  winter,  which  was  now  approaching. 
But  to  his  astonishment  he  found  the  city  deserted  by  its  inhabi- 
tants ;  and  scarcely  had  he  established  himself  in  the  empty  palace 


6S4  THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE  FIRST  EMPIRE. 

of  the  Czar  (the  Kremlin),  before  the  city,  probably  fired  by  per- 
sons whom  the  Russians  had  left  behind  for  this  purpose,  burst 
into  flames.  After  waiting  about  the  ruins  until  the  middle  of 
October,  in  hopes  that  the  Czar  would  accept  proposals  of  peace, 
Napoleon  was  forced  to  give  the  command  for  the  return  of  the 
army  to  France. 

The  retreat  was  attended  with  incredible  sufferings  and  horrors. 
The  Russian  winter  setting  in  earlier  than  usual  and  with  terrible 
severity,  thousands  of  the  French  soldiers  were  frozen  to  death, 
and  falling  upon  the  snow  traced  with  a  long  black  line  the  trail 
of  the  retreating  army.  The  spot  of  each  bivouac  was  marked  by 
the  circles  of  dead  around  the  watch-fires.  Thousands  more  were 
slain  by  the  wild  Cossacks,  who  surrounded  the  retreating  columns 
and  harassed  them  day  and  night.  The  passage  of  the  river 
Beresina  was  attended  with  appalling  losses. 

Soon  after  the  passage  of  this  stream,  Napoleon,  conscious  that 
the  fate  of  his  empire  depended  upon  his  presence  in  Paris,  left 
the  remnant  of  the  army  in  charge  of  his  marshals,  and  hurried  by 
post  to  his  capital.  Marshal  Ney,  "the  bravest  of  the  brave," 
performed  miracles  in  covering  the  retreat  of  the  broken  and 
dispirited  columns.  He  was  the  last  man,  it  is  said,  to  cross  the 
Niemen.  His  face  was  so  haggard  from  care  and  so  begrimed 
with  powder,  that  no  one  recognized  him.  Being  asked  who  he 
was,  he  replied,   "  I  am  the  rear  guard  of  the  Grand  Army." 

The  loss  by  death  of  the  French  and  their  allies  in  this  disas- 
trous campaign  is  reckoned  at  about  300,000  men,1  while  that  of 
the  Russians  is  estimated  to  have  been  almost  as  large. 

"The  Battle  of  the  Nations"  (Leipsic,  1813).  —  Napoleon's 
fortunes  were  buried  with  his  Grand  Army  in  the  snows  of  Russia. 
His  woeful  losses  emboldened  the  surrounding  powers  to  think  that 
now  they  could  crush  him.  A  sixth  coalition  was  formed,  embrac- 
ing Russia,  Prussia,  England,  and  Sweden.  Napoleon  made  gigan- 
tic efforts  to  prepare  France  for  the  struggle.  By  the  spring  of  181 3 
he  was  at  the  head  of  a  new  army,  numbering  over  300,000  men. 

1  I  be  Russians  took  100,000  prisoners,  and  about  ioo,ooo  recrossed  the 
Niemen. 


THE  ABDICATION  OF  NAPOLEON.  685 

Falling  upon  the  allied  armies  of  the  Russians  and  Prussians, 
first  at  Lutzen  and  then  at  Bautzen,  he  gained  a  decisive  victory 
upon  both  fields.  Austria  now  appeared  in  the  lists,  and  at 
Leipsic  the  French  were  met  by  the  leagued  armies  of  Europe. 
So  many  were  the  powers  represented  upon  the  renowned  field, 
that  it  is  known  in  history  as  the  "  Battle  of  the  Nations."  The 
combat  lasted  three  days.  Napoleon  was  defeated,  and  forced  to 
retreat  into  France. 

The  Abdication  of  Napoleon  (1814).  —  The  armies  of  the 
allies  now  poured  over  all  the  French  frontiers.  Napoleon's  tre- 
mendous efforts  to  roll  back  the  tide  of  invasion  were  all  in  vain. 
As  the  struggle  became  manifestly  hopeless,  his  most  trusted  offi- 
cers deserted  and  betrayed  him.  Paris  surrendered  to  the  allies. 
Napoleon  was  forced  to  abdicate,  and  the  ancient  House  of  the 
Bourbons  was  reestablished  in  the  person  of  a  brother  of  Louis 
XVI.,  who  took  the  title  of  Louis  XVIII.  Napoleon  was  banished 
to  the  little  island  of  Elba  in  the  Mediterranean,  being  permitted 
to  retain  his  title  of  Emperor,  and  to  keep  about  him  a  few  hun- 
dred of  his  old  guards.  But  Elba  was  a  very  diminutive  empire 
for  one  to  whom  the  half  of  Europe  seemed  too  small,  and  we  shall 
not  be  surprised  to  learn  that  Napoleon  was  not  content  with  it. 

The  Congress  of  Vienna  (Sept.,  1814-June,  1815).  —  After  the 
overthrow  of  Napoleon,  commissioners  of  the  different  European 
states  met  at  Vienna  to  readjust  the  map  of  Europe.  It  was  a 
great  task  to  harmonize  the  conflicting  claims  that  came  before  the 
convention,  and  to  effect  a  settlement  of  the  continent  that  should 
satisfy  all  parties.  But  after  nearly  a  year  of  negotiations  and 
debate,  an  agreement  respecting  the  boundaries  and  relations  of 
the  various  states  was  reached.  As  we  shall  hereafter,  in  connec- 
tion with  the  history  of  the  separate  countries,  have  occasion  to 
say  something  respecting  the  relations  of  each  to  the  Congress, 
we  shall  here  say  but  a  word  regarding  the  temper  of  the  assembly 
and  the  general  character  of  its  work. 

The  Vienna  commissioners  seemed  to  have  had  but  one  thought 
and  aim  —  to  put  everything  back  as  near  as  possible  in  the  shape 


686         THE   CONSULATE  AND    THE   FIRST  EMPIRE. 

that  it  was  in  before  the  Revolution.  They  had  no  care  for  the 
people ;  the  princes  were  their  only  concern.  The  crowd  of 
thrones  that  Napoleon  had  overturned  were  righted,  and  the  old 
despots  were  invited  to  remount  them.  Italy  and  Germany  were 
divided  among  a  horde  of  petty  tyrants.  In  Spain  and  Naples  the 
old  Bourbon  families  were  re-instated,  and  the  former  despotisms 
renewed.  In  short,  the  clock  was  set  back  to  the  hour  when  the 
Bastile  was  attacked.  Everything  that  had  happened  since  was 
utterly  ignored. 

But  the  Revolution  had  destroyed  privilege  as  expressed  in  the 
effete  feudal  aristocracies  of  Europe,  and  impaired  beyond  resto- 
ration the  monstrous  doctrine  of  the  divine  right  of  kings.  '  An 
attempt  to  bring  these  things  back  again  was  an  attempt  to  restore 
life  to  the  dead,  —  to  set  up  again  the  fallen  Dagon  in  his  place. 

Notwithstanding,  the  commissioners  at  Vienna,  blind  to  the  spirit 
and  tendencies  of  the  times,  did  set  up  once  more  the  broken 
idol,  —  only,  however,  to  see  it  flung  down  again  by  the  memo- 
rable social  upheavals  of  the  next  half  century.  The  kings  had 
had  their  Congress  :  the  people  were  to  have  theirs,  —  in  1820  and 
'30  and  '48. 

The  Hundred  Days  (March  20-June  29,  1815).  — The  allies 
who  placed  Louis  XVIII.  upon  the  French  throne  set  back  the 
boundaries  of  France  as  nearly  as  possible  to  the  lines  they  occu- 
pied in  1792.  In  like  manner  the  king  himself,  seemingly  utterly 
oblivious  to  the  spirit  and  tendencies  of  the  times,  as  soon  as  he 
was  in  possession  of  the  ancient  inheritance  of  his  family,  began 
to  put  back  everything  just  as  it  was  before  the  reforms  of  the 
Revolution.  He  always  alluded  to  the  year  he  began  to  rule  as 
the  nineteenth  of  his  reign,  thus  affecting  to  ignore  entirely  the 
government  of  the  republic  and  of  the  empire. 

The  result  of  this  reactionary  policy  was  widespread  dissatis- 
faction throughout  France.  Many  began  to  desire  the  return  of 
Napoleon,  and  the  wish  was  perhaps  what  gave  rise  to  the  report 
which  was  spread  about  that  he  would  come  back  with  the  spring 
violets. 


THE  HUNDRED  DAYS.  687 

In  the  month  of  March,  1815,  as  the  commissioners  of  the 
various  powers  were  sitting  at  Vienna  rearranging  the  landmarks 
and  boundaries  obliterated  by  the  French  inundation,  news  was 
brought  to  them  that  Napoleon  had  escaped  from  Elba  and  was  in 
France.  At  first  the  members  of  the  Congress  were  incredulous, 
regarding  the  thing  as  a  jest,  and  were  with  difficulty  convinced  of 
the  truth  of  the  report. 

Taking  advantage  of  the  general  dissatisfaction  with  the  rule  of 
the  restored  Bourbons,  Napoleon  had  resolved  upon  a  bold  push 
for  the  recovery  of  his  crown.  Landing  with  a  few  followers  at 
one  of  the  southern  ports  of  France,  he  aroused  all  the  country 
with  one  of  his  stirring  addresses,  and  then  immediately  pushed 
on  towards  Paris.  Never  was  the  changeable,  impulsive  character 
of  the  French  people  better  illustrated  than  now ;  and  never  was 
better  exhibited  the  wonderful  personal  magnetism  of  Napoleon. 
His  journey  to  the  capital  was  one  continuous  ovation.  One 
regiment  after  another,  forgetting  their  recent  oath  of  loyalty  to 
the  Bourbons,  hastened  to  join  his  train.  His  old  generals  and 
soldiers  embraced  him  with  transports  of  joy.  Louis  XVIII.,  de- 
serted by  his  army,  was  left  helpless,  and,  as  Napoleon  approached 
the  gates  of  Paris,  fled  from  his  throne. 

Napoleon  desired  peace  with  the  sovereigns  of  Europe  ;  but  they 
did  not  think  the  peace  of  the  continent  could  be  maintained  so 
long  as  he  sat  upon  the  French  throne.  For  the  seventh  and  last 
time  the  allies  leagued  their  armies  to  crush  the  man  of  destiny. 
A  million  of  men  poured  over  the  frontiers  of  France. 

Hoping  to  overwhelm  the  armies  of  the  allies  by  striking  them 
one  after  another  before  they  had  time  to  unite,  Napoleon  moved 
swiftly  into  Belgium  with  an  army  of  130,000,  in  order  to  crush 
there  the  English  and  Prussians.  He  first  fell  in  with  and  de- 
feated the  Prussian  army  under  Blticher,  and  then  faced  the  Eng- 
lish at  Waterloo  (June  18,  1815). 

The  story  of  Waterloo  need  not  be  told,  —  how  all  day  the 
French  broke  their  columns  in  vain  on  the  English  squares ;  how, 
at  the  critical  moment  at  the  close  of  the  day,  Blucher  with  a 


688        FRANCE  SINCE    THE  SECOND  RESTORATION 

fresh  force  of  30,000  Prussians  turned  the  tide  of  battle ;  and 
how  the  famous  Old  Guard,  that  knew  how  to  die  but  not  how  to 
surrender,  made  its  last  charge,  and  left  its  hitherto  invincible 
squares  upon  the  lost  field. 

A  second  time  Napoleon  was  forced  to  abdicate,  and  a  second 
time  Louis  XVIII.  was  lifted  by  the  allies  upon  his  unstable 
throne.  Bonaparte  desired  to  be  allowed  to  retire  to  America, 
but  his  enemies  believed  that  his  presence  there  would  not  be  con- 
sistent with  the  safety  of  Europe.  Consequently  he  was  banished 
to  the  island  of  St.  Helena,  in  the  South  Atlantic,  and  there  closely 
guarded  by  the  British  until  his  death,  in  1821. 

2.   France  since  the  Second  Restoration  (1815-        ). 

Character  of  the  Period.  —  The  history  of  France  since  the 
second  restoration  of  the  Bourbons  may  be  characterized  briefly.  It 
has  been  simply  a  continuation  of  the  Revolution,  of  the  struggle 
between  democratic  and  monarchical  tendencies.  The  aim  of 
the  Revolution  was  to  abolish  privileges  and  establish  rights, — 
to  give  every  man  lot  and  part  in  shaping  the  government  under 
which  he  lives.  These  republican  ideas  and  principles  have,  on 
the  whole,  notwithstanding  repeated  reverses,  gained  ground ;  for 
revolutions  never  move  backward.  There  may  be  eddies  and 
counter-currents  in  a  river,  but  the  steady  and  powerful  sweep  of 
the  stream  is  ever  onward  towards  the  sea.  Not  otherwise  is  it 
with  the  great  political  and  intellectual  movements  of  history. 

The  Revolution  of  1830.  —  Profiting  by  the  lessons  of  The  Hun- 
dred Days,  Louis  XVIII.  ruled  after  the  second  restoration  with 
reasonable  heed  to  the  results  and  changes  effected  by  the  Revo- 
lution. But  upon  the  death  of  Louis  in  1824  and  the  accession 
of  Charles  X.,  a  reactionary  policy  was  adopted.  The  new  king 
seemed  utterly  incapable  of  profiting  by  the  teachings  of  the  Rev- 
olution. His  blind,  stubborn  course  gave  rise  to  the  saying,  "  A 
Bourbon  learns  nothing  and  forgets  nothing."  The  result  might 
have  been  foreseen.  The  people  rose  in  revolt,  and  by  one  of 
those  sudden  movements  for  which  Paris  is  so  noted,  the  despot 


THE  REVOLUTION  OF  1830.  6S9 

was  driven  into  exile,  and  Louis  Philippe,  Duke  of  Orleans,  was 
placed  on  the  throne  (1830). 

A  new  constitution  was  now  given  to  France,  and  as  Louis  Phil- 
ippe had  travelled  about  the  world  considerably,  and  had  expe- 
rienced various  vicissitudes  of  fortune,  —  having  at  one  time  been 
obliged  to  support  himself  by  teaching  mathematics,  —  the  people 
regarded  him  as  one  of  themselves,  and  anticipated  much  from 
their  "  Citizen  King  "  and  their  reformed  constitution. 

The  French  "July  Revolution,"  as  it  is  called,  lighted  the  signal 
fires  of  liberty  throughout  Europe.  In  almost  every  country  there 
were  uprisings  of  the  Liberals.  Existing  constitutions  were  so 
changed  as  to  give  the  people  a  larger  share  in  the  government ; 
and  where  there  were  no  constitutions,  original  charters  were 
granted.  In  some  instances,  indeed,  the  uprisings  had  no  other 
result  than  that  of  rendering  the  despotic  governments  against 
which  they  were  directed  more  cruel  and  tyrannical  than  they 
were  before ;  yet,  on  the  whole,  a  decided  impulse  was  given  to 
the  cause  of  constitutional,  republican  government.1 

Establishment  of  the  Second  Republic  (1848).  —  The  reign  of 
Louis  Philippe  up  to  1848  was  very  unquiet,  yet  was  not  marked 
by  any  disturbance  of  great  importance.  But  during  all  this  time 
the  ideas  of  the  Revolution  were  working  among  the  people,  and 
the  republican  party  was  constantly  gaining  strength.  Finally,  in 
1848,  some  unpopular  measures  of  the  government  caused  an  up- 
rising similar  to  that  of  1830.  Louis  Philippe,  under  the  assumed 
name  of  Mr.  Smith,  fled  into  England.  The  Second  Republic  was 
now  established.  An  election  being  ordered,  Louis  Napoleon 
Bonaparte,  nephew  of  the  great  Napoleon,  was  chosen  president 
of  the  new  republic  (Dec.  20,  1848). 

1  It  was  at  this  time  that  Belgium  became  an  independent  state;  for  upon 
the  downfall  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte  in  181 5,  the  Congress  of  Vienna  had 
made  the  Ixnv  Countries  into  a  single  kingdom,  and  given  the  crown  to  a 
prince  of  the  House  of  Orange.  The  Belgians  now  arose  and  declared  them- 
selves independent  of  Holland,  adopted  a  liberal  constitution,  and  elected 
Leopold  I.,  of  Saxe-Coburg,  as  their  king  (1831). 


690        FRANCE    SINCE    THE  SECOND  RESTORATION. 

The  truth  of  the  first  Napoleon's  declaration,  which  we  have 
before  quoted,  that  a  revolution  in  France  is  sure  to  be  followed 
by  a  revolution  throughout  Europe,  was  now  illustrated  anew. 
Almost  every  throne  upon  the  continent  felt  the  shock  of  the 
French  Revolution  of  1848.  The  constitutions  of  many  of  the 
surrounding  states  again  underwent  great  changes  in  the  interest 
of  the  people  and  of  liberty.  "  It  is  scarcely  an  exaggeration  to 
say  that  during  the  month  of  March,  1848,  not  a  single  day  passed 
without  a  constitution  being  granted  somewhere."  France  had 
made  another  of  her  irresistible  invasions  of  the  states  of  Europe 
—  "  an  invasion  of  ideas." 

The  Second  Empire  (1852-1870).  —  The  life  of  the  Second 
Republic  spanned  only  three  years.  By  almost  exactly  the  same 
steps  as  those  by  which  his  uncle  had  mounted  the  French  throne, 
Louis  Napoleon  now  also  ascended  to  the  imperial  dignity,  crush- 
ing the  republic  as  he  rose. 

Dissensions  having  arisen  between  the  President  and  the  Legis- 
lative Assembly,  he  suddenly  dissolved  that  body,  placed  its  leaders 
under  arrest,  and  then  appealed  to  the  country  to  indorse  what  he 
had  done.  By  a  most  extraordinary  vote  of  7,437,216  to  640,737 
the  nation  approved  of  the  President's  coup  d'etat,  and  rewarded 
him  for  it  by  electing  him  President  for  ten  years,  which  was  virtu- 
ally making  him  dictator.  The  next  year  he  was  made  emperor, 
and  took  the  title  of  Napoleon  III.  (1852). 

The  important  political  events  of  the  reign  of  Napoleon  III. 
were  the  Crimean  War  (1853-1856),  the  Austro-Sardinian  War 
(1859),  and  the  Franco-Prussian  War  (1870-1871).  The  first 
and  second  of  these  wars  need  not  detain  us  at  this  time,  as  we 
shall  speak  of  them  hereafter  in  connection  with  Russian  and 
Italian  affairs. 

The  third  war  was  with  Prussia.  The  real  causes  of  this  war 
were  French  jealousy  of  the  growing  power  of  Prussia,  and  the 
Emperor's  anxiety  to  strengthen  his  government  in  the  affections 
of  the  French  people  by  reviving  the  military  glory  of  the  reign  of 
his  great-uncle.     The  pretext  upon  which  the  war  was  actually 


THE   SECOND  EMPIRE.  691 

declared  was  that  Prussia  was  scheming  to  augment  her  influence 
by  allowing  a  Prussian  prince  (Leopold  of  Hohenzollern)  to 
become  a  candidate  for  the  vacant  throne  of  Spain  (see  p.  705). 

The  French  armies  invaded  Germany,  but  were  pushed  back  by 
the  Prussians  and  their  allies,  who  followed  the  retreating  enemy 
across  the  frontier,  defeated  one  large  French  army  at  Gravelotte 
(Aug.  18,  1870)  and  imprisoned  it  in  Metz,  captured  the  strong 
fortress  of  Sedan,  —  making  a  prisoner  here  of  the  emperor  him- 
self,1 —  and  then  advancing  upon  Paris,  forced  that  city,  after  an 
investment  of  a  few  months,  to  capitulate  (Jan.  28,  1871). 

The  terms  of  the  treaty  that  followed  were  that  France  should 
surrender  to  Germany  the  greater  portion  of  the  Rhenish  provinces 
of  Alsace  and  Lorraine,  pay  an  indemnity  of  5,000,000,000  francs 
(about  $1,000,000,000),  and  consent  to  the  occupation  of  certain 
portions  of  French  territory  until  the  fine  was  paid. 

The  Red  Republicans,  or  Communists,  of  Paris,  indignant  at  the 
terms  of  the  treaty,  shut  the  gates  of  the  city,  and  called  the  pop- 
ulation to  arms,  declaring  that  the  capital  would  never  submit  to 
see  France  thus  dismembered  and  humiliated.  A  second  reign  of 
terror  was  now  set  up.  The  Tuileries,  the  Hotel  de  Ville,  and  many 
other  public  buildings  were  burned.  The  government  at  length 
succeeded  in  suppressing  the  Anarchists,  and  restoring  order. 

The  Third  Republic  (1 871).  — The  organization  of  the  Third 
Republic  was  now  completed.  M.  Thiers,  the  historian,  was  made 
its  first  president2  (Aug.  31,  1871).  Since  the  establishment  of 
the  republic,  its  enemies  have  been  busy  and  vigilant,  hoping  to 
see  democratic  institutions  discredited  and  the  monarchy  revived. 
But  it  is  believed  that  each  succeeding  year  of  republican  govern- 
ment in  France  strengthens  the  faith  of  the  French  people  in 
their  ability  to  govern  themselves,  and  that  the  history  of  France 
as  a  monarchy  is  ended. 

1  After  the  war  Louis  Napoleon  found  an  asylum  in  England  (at  Chisel- 
hurst),  where  he  died  January  9,  1873. 

2  The  successors  of  M.  Thiers  have  been  Marshal  MacMahon(i873-i879), 
If,  <irevy  (1879-1887),  and  M.  Carnot  (1887). 


692  RUSSIA   SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 


CHAPTER    LX. 

RUSSIA  SINCE    THE  CONGRESS  OF  VIENNA. 

Alexander  I.  and  the  Holy  Alliance.  —  Upon  the  downfall  of 
Napoleon,  Alexander  I.  (i 801-1825)  of  Russia  organized  the 
celebrated  union  known  as  the  Holy  Alliance.  This  was  a  league 
embracing  as  its  chief  members  Russia,  Austria,  and  Prussia,  the 
ostensible  object  of  which  was  the  maintenance  of  religion,  peace, 
and  order  in  Europe,  and  the  reduction  to  practice  in  politics  of 
the  maxims  of  Christ.  The  several  sovereigns  entering  into  the 
union  promised  to  be  fathers  to  their  people,  to  rule  in  love  and 
with  reference  solely  to  the  promotion  of  the  welfare  of  their 
subjects,  and  to  help  one  another  as  brothers  to  maintain  just 
government  and  prevent  wrong. 

All  this  had  a  very  millennial  look.  But  the  "  Holy  Alliance  " 
very  soon  became  practically  a  league  for  the  maintenance  of 
absolute  principles  of  government,  in  opposition  to  the  liberal 
tendencies  of  the  age.  Under  the  pretext  of  maintaining  religion, 
justice,  and  order,  the  sovereigns  of  the  union  acted  in  concert  to 
suppress  every  aspiration  among  their  subjects  for  political  liberty. 
Yet,  when  Alexander  founded  the  alliance,  he  meant  all  that  he 
said.  But  conspiracies  among  his  own  subjects,  and  popular  upris- 
ings throughout  Europe,  all  tended  to  create  in  him  a  revulsion  of 
feeling.  From  an  ardent  apostle  of  liberal  ideas,  such  as  he  was 
during  all  the  earlier  part  of  his  reign,  he  was  transformed  into  a 
violent  absolutist,  and  spent  all  his  later  years  in  aiding  the  des- 
potic rulers  of  Spain,  Italy,  and  Germany  to  crush  every  uprising 
among  their  subjects  for  political  freedom. 

This  reactionary  policy  of  Alexander  caused  bitter  disappoint- 
ment among  the  Liberals  in  Russia,  the  number  of  whom  was  large, 


RUSSO-TURKISH   WAR   OF  1828-1829.  693 

for  the  Russian  armies  that  helped  to  crush  Napoleon  came  back 
from  the  West  with  many  new  and  liberal  ideas  awakened  by  what 
they  had  seen  and  heard  and  experienced. 

The  Russo-Turkish  War  of  1828-1829.  —  In  1825  Alexander 
I.  was  succeeded  by  his  brother  Nicholas  I.  (1825-1855),  "a 
terrible  incarnation  of  autocracy."  He  carried  out  the  later 
policy  of  his  predecessor,  and  strove  to  shut  out  from  his  empire 
all  the  liberalizing  influences  of  Western  Europe. 

In  1828,  taking  advantage  of  the  embarrassment  of  the  Sultan 
through  a  stubborn  insurrection  in  Greece,1  Nicholas  declared  war 
against  the  Ottoman  Porte.  The  Balkans  were  quickly  passed, 
and  the  victorious  armies  of  the  Czar  were  in  full  march  upon  Con- 
stantinople, when  their  advance  was  checked  by  the  jealous  inter- 
ference of  England  and  Austria,  through  whose  mediation  the  war 
was  brought  to  a  close  by  the  Peace  of  Adrianople  (1829).  Nich- 
olas restored  all  his  conquests  in  Europe,  but  held  some  provinces 
in  Asia  which  gave  him  control  of  the  eastern  shore  of  the  Euxine. 
Greece  was  liberated,  and  Servia  became  virtually  independent  of 
the  Sultan.  Thus  the  result  of  the  contest  was  greatly  to  dimin- 
ish the  strength  and  influence  of  Turkey,  and  correspondingly  to 
increase  the  power  and  prestige  of  Russia. 

Revolution  in  Poland  (1 830-1 832).  —  The  Congress  of  Vi- 
enna (181 5)  re-established  Poland  as  a  constitutional  kingdom 
dependent  upon  Russia.  But  the  rule  of  the  Czar  over  the  Poles 
was  tyrannical,  and  they  were  impatient  of  an  opportunity  to  throw 
off  the  Russian  yoke.  The  revolutionary  movements  of  the  year 
1830  sent  a  wave  of  hope  through  Poland  ;  the  people  arose  and 
drove  out  the  Russian  garrisons.  But  the  armies  of  the  Czar 
quickly  poured  over  the  frontiers  of  the  revolted  state,  and  before 

1  This  was  the  struggle  known  as  the  "  War  of  Grecian  Independence." 
It  was  characterized  by  the  most  frightful  barbarities  on  the  part  of  the  Turks. 
Lord  Byron  enlisted  on  the  side  of  the  Greeks.  The  result  of  the  war  was 
the  freeing  of  Greece  from  Turkish  rule.  England,  France,  and  Russia  be- 
came the  guardians  of  the  little  state,  the  crown  of  which  was  given  to  Prince 
Otto  of  Bavaria  (Otto  I.,  1832-1862). 


694  RUSSIA   SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

the  close  of  the  year  1831  the  Polish  patriots  were  once  more 
under  the  foot  of  their  Russian  master. 

It  was  a  hard  fate  that  awaited  the  unhappy  nation.  Their  con- 
stitution was  taken  away,  and  Poland  was  made  a  province  of  the 
Russian  empire  (1832).  Multitudes  were  banished  to  Siberia, 
while  thousands  more  expatriated  themselves,^  seeking  an  asylum 
in  England,  America,  and  other  countries.  Of  all  the  peoples  that 
rose  for  freedom  in  1830  none  suffered  so  cruel  and  complete  an 
extinguishment  of  their  hopes  as  did  the  patriot  Poles.1 

The  Crimean  War  (1853-1856).  —  A  celebrated  phrase  ap- 
plied to  the  Ottoman  Porte  by  the  Czar  Nicholas  casts  a  good 
deal  of  light  upon  the  circumstances  that  led  to  the  Crimean  War. 
"  We  have  on  our  hands,"  said  the  Czar,  "  a  sick  man  —  a  very 
•  sick  man ;  I  tell  you  frankly  it  would  be  a  great  misfortune  if  he 
should  give  us  the  slip  some  of  these  days,  especially  if  it  happened 
before  all  the  necessary  arrangements  were  made." 

Nicholas  had  cultivated  friendly  relations  with  the  English  gov- 
ernment, and  he  now  proposed  that  England  and  Russia,  as  the 
parties  most  directly  interested,  should  divide  the  estate  of  the 
"  sick  man."  England  was  to  be  allowed  to  take  Egypt  and  Crete, 
while  the  Turkish  provinces  in  Europe  were  to  be  taken  under  the 
protection  of  the  Czar,  which  meant  of  course  the  complete  absorp- 
tion, in  due  time,  of  all  Southeastern  Europe  into  the  Russian 
empire. 

A  pretence  for  hastening  the  dissolution  of  the  sick  man  was 
not  long  wanting.  A  quarrel  between  the  Greek  and  Latin  Chris- 
tians at  Jerusalem  about  the  holy  places  was  made  the  ground  by 
Nicholas  for  demanding  of  the  Sultan  the  admission  and  recogni- 
tion of  a  Russian  protectorate  over  all  Greek  Christians  in  the 
Ottoman  dominions.  The  demand  was  rejected,  and  Nicholas 
prepared  for  war. 

The  Sultan  appealed  to  the  Western  powers  for  help.  England 
and  France  responded  to  the  appeal,  and  later  Sardinia  joined  her 

1  For  Russia's  part  in  the  affairs  of  the  revolutionary  years  1848-49,  see 
p.  702. 


THE    CRIMEAN   WAR.  695 

forces  to  theirs.  England,  rejecting  the  Czar's  proposal  of  a 
division  of  the  dying  man's  estate,  fought  to  prevent  Russia  from 
getting  through  the  Bosporus  to  the  Mediterranean,  and  thus 
endangering  her  route  to  her  Eastern  possessions.  The  French 
emperor  fought  to  avenge  Moscow,  and  to  render  his  new  imperial 
throne  attractive  to  his  people  by  surrounding  it  with  the  glamour 
of  successful  war.  Sardinia  was  led  to  join  England  and  France 
through  the  policy  of  the  far-sighted  Cavour,  who  would  thus  have 
the  Sardinians  win  the  gratitude  of  these  powers,  so  that  in  the  next 
conflict  with  Austria  the  Italian  patriots  might  have  some  strong 
friends  to  help  them. 

The  main  interest  of  the  struggle  centred  about  Sebastopol, 
in  the  Crimea,  Russia's  great  naval  and  military  depot,  and  the 
key  to  the  Euxine.  Around  this  strongly  fortified  place  were 
finally  gathered  175,000  soldiers  of  the  allies.  The  siege,  which 
lasted  eleven  months,  was  one  of  the  most  memorable  and  de- 
structive in  history.  The  Russian  engineer  Todleben  earned  a 
great  fame  through  his  masterly  defence  of  the  works.  The 
English  "  Light  Brigade  g  earned  immortality  in  their  memorable 
charge  at  Balaklava.  The  French  troops,  through  their  dashing 
bravery,  brought  great  fame  to  the  emperor  who  had  sent  them 
to  gather  glory  for  his  throne. 

The  Russians  were  at  length  forced  to  evacuate  the  place. 
They  left  it,  however,  a  "second  Moscow."  The  war  was  now 
soon  brought  to  an  end  by  the  Treaty  of  Paris  (1856).  Every 
provision  of  the  treaty  had  in  view  the  maintenance  of  the  integ- 
rity of  the  empire  of  the  Sultan,  and  the  restraining  of  the  ambi- 
tion of  the  Czar.  Russia  was  given  back  Sebastopol,  but  was 
required  to  give  up  some  territory  at  the  mouth  of  the  Danube, 
whereby  her  frontier  was  pushed  back  from  that  river ;  to  abandon 
all  claims  to  a  protectorate  over  any  of  the  subjects  of  the  Porte ; 
to  agree  not  to  raise  any  more  fortresses  on  the  Euxine  nor  keep 
upon  that  sea  any  armed  ships,  save  what  might  be  needed  for  po- 
lice service.  The  Christian  population  of  the  Turkish  dominions 
were  placed  under  the  guardianship  of  the  great  powers,  who  were 


696  RUSSIA   SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

to  see  that  the  Sublime  Porte  fulfilled  its  promise  of  granting  per- 
fect civil  and  religious  equality  and  protection  to  all  its  subjects. 

Emancipation  of  the  Serfs  (1858-1863). — Alexander  II. 
(1855-1881),  who  came  to  the  Russian  throne  in  the  midst  of 
the  Crimean  War,  abandoned  the  narrow  and  intolerant  system 
of  his  predecessor  Nicholas,  and  reverting  as  it  were  to  the  policy 
of  Peter  the  Great,  labored  for  popular  reform,  and  for  the  intro- 
duction into  his  dominions  of  the  ideas  and  civilization  of  Western 
Europe.  The  reform  which  will  ever  give  his  name  a  place  in  the 
list  of  those  rulers  who  have  conferred  singular  benefits  upon  their 
subjects,  was  the  emancipation,  by  a  series  of  imperial  edicts,  of 
the  Russian  serfs,  who  made  up  more  than  45,000,000  of  the  pop- 
ulation of  the  empire.  More  than  half  of  these  serfs  belonged  to 
the  Crown,  and  were  known  as  Crown  peasants. 

The  Crown  serfs  were  only  nominal  bondsmen,  their  servitude 
consisting  in  scarcely  more  than  the  payment  of  a  light  rent.  The 
serfs  of  individual  proprietors,  however,  might  be  designated  as 
semi-slaves.  Thus,  their  owners  could  flog  them  in  case  of  dis- 
obedience, but  could  not  sell  them  individually  as  slaves  are  sold ; 
yet  when  a  proprietor  sold  his  estate,  the  whole  community  of  serfs 
living  upon  it  passed  with  it  to  the  purchaser. 

Besides  the  emancipation  measure,  Alexander's  name  is  associ- 
ated with  other  reforms,  the  earlier  part  of  his  reign  especially 
being  characterized  by  a  very  liberal  spirit.  This  liberal  policy 
was  followed  until  the  revolt  of  the  Poles  in  1863,  when  Alex- 
ander was  led  to  adopt  a  more  reactionary  policy,  a  policy  which 
persistently  pursued  has  yielded  bitter  fruit  in  Nihilism. 

The  Russo-Tnrkish  War  of  1877-1878.  —  Anxiously  as  the 
Treaty  of  Paris  had  provided  for  the  permanent  settlement  of  the 
Eastern  Question,  barely  twenty-two  years  had  passed  before  it 
was  again  up  before  Europe,  and  Russia  and  Turkey  were  again  in 
arms.  The  Sultan  could  not  or  would  not  give  to  his  Christian 
subjects  that  equal  protection  of  the  laws  which  he  had  solemnly 
promised  should  be  given.  The  Moslem  hatred  of  the  Christians 
was  constantly  leading  to  disturbance  and  outrage.    In  i860  there 


THE  RUSSO-TURKISH   WAR    OF  1 877-1 878. 


697 


was  a  great  massacre  of  Syrian  Christians  by  the  Druses  and  Turks, 
and  in  1876  occurred  in  Bulgaria  the  so-called  "  Bulgarian  atroci- 
ties," massacres  of  Christian  men,  women,  and  children,  more 
revolting  perhaps  than  any  others  of  which  history  tells.  The 
greatest  indignation  was  kindled  throughout  Europe.  The  Russian 
armies  were  set  in   motion    (1877).     Kars   in   Asia  Minor  and 


Gortchakoff. 


mwaloff. 


THE   CONGRESS   OF   BERLIN. 
(By  Anton  von  Werner,  Prussian  Court  Painter.) 


Plevna  in  European  Turkey  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Russians,  and 
the  armies  of  the  Czar  were  once  more  in  full  march  upon  Con- 
stantinople, with  the  prospect  of  soon  ending  forever  Turkish  rule 
on  European  soil,  when  England,  as  in  1829,  interfered,  and  by 
the  movements  of  her  iron-clads  in  the  Bosporus  again  arrested  the 
triumphant  march  of  the  Russians. 
The  Treaty  of  Berlin  (1878)  adjusted  once  more  the  disorgan- 


698  XUSS/.4   SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

ized  affairs  of  the  Sublime  Porte,  and  bolstered  as  well  as  was  pos- 
sible the  "sick  man."  But  he  lost  a  good  part  of  his  estate. 
Out  of  those  provinces  of  his  dominions  in  Europe  in  which  the 
Christian  population  was  most  numerous,  there  was  created  a  group 
of  wholly  independent  or  half-independent  states.  The  absolute 
independence  of  Roumania,  Servia,  and  Montenegro  was  formally 
acknowledged ;  Bulgaria,  north  of  the  Balkans,  was  to  enjoy  self- 
government,  but  was  to  pay  a  tribute  to  the  Porte  ;  East  Roumelia 
was  to  have  a  Christian  governor,  but  was  to  remain  under  the 
dominion  of  the  Sultan.  The  Balkans  were  thus  made  the  north- 
ern boundary  of  the  Turkish  empire  in  Europe.  Bosnia  and 
Herzegovina  were  given  to  the  Austro- Hungarian  monarchy. 
Russia  acquired  some  places  in  Armenia,  and  also  received  Bes- 
sarabia on  the  Lower  Danube. 

In  a  word,  Russia  regained  everything  she  had  lost  in  the  Cri- 
mean struggle,  while  Turkey  was  shorn  of  half  her  European  pos- 
sessions. There  were  left  in  Europe  under  the  direct  authority  of 
the  Sultan  barely  5,000,000  subjects,  of  which  number  about  one- 
half  are  Christians.  England  alone  is  responsible  for  the  work  of 
emancipation  not  having  been  made  complete. 

Nihilism  and  the  Exile  System.  —  Russian  Nihilism  is  a  smoth- 
ered French  Revolution.  It  is  the  form  which  Liberalism  has 
taken  under  the  repressions  of  a  despotic  autocracy ;  for  the  gov- 
ernment of  Russia  is  a  perfect  absolutism,  the  Czar  alone  being 
legislator,  judge,  and  executive  for  the  Russian  nation  of  85,000,000 
souls.  He  makes  laws,  levies  taxes,  expends  the  revenue,  and 
condemns  his  subjects  to  exile  or  death,  according  to  his  own  will, 
without  let  or  hindrance.  The  terrible  character  of  the  repressive 
measures  of  the  government  is  revealed  by  the  fact  that  during  the 
years  1879  and  1880  sixty  thousand  persons  were,  without  trial, 
sent  into  exile  in  Siberia.1 

It  is  a  principle  of  the  extreme  Nihilists,  that  assassination  is  a 
righteous  means  of  reform.     Within  the  last  few  years  many  at- 

1  On  the  Exile  System  of  Russia  read  the  excellent  series  of  articles  by 
George  Kennan  in  The  Century  Magazine  for  1888-9. 


THE   EXILE   SYSTEM.  6% 

tempts  have  been  made  upon  the  life  of  the  reigning  Czar.  On 
March  13,  1881,  Alexander  II.  was  killed  by  means  of  a  bomb 
filled  with  dynamite. 

The  son  of  the  murdered  Czar  who  now  came  to  the  throne  as 
Alexander  III.,  immediately  instituted  a  still  more  sternly  repres- 
sive system  than  that  pursued  by  his  father,  whom  he  seemed  to 
regard  as  the  victim  of  the  over-liberal  policy  of  the  earlier  years 
of  his  reign.  It  appears  to  be  his  determination  to  close  his 
empire  against  the  entrance  of  all  liberal  or  progressive  ideas,  po- 
litical, religious,  and  scientific,  of  Western  Europe.  A  rigid  cen- 
sorship of  the  press  is  being  maintained  (1889),  and  the  writings 
of  such  authors  as  Huxley,  Spencer,  Agassiz,  Lyell,  and  Adam 
Smith,  are  forbidden  circulation. 

There  can  be  but  one  outcome  to  this  contest  between  the 
"  Autocrat  of  all  the  Russias  "  and  his  subjects.  Either  through 
wise  concessions  on  the  part  of  its  rulers,  or  through  the  throes 
of  a  terrible  revolution,  like  that  of  1789  in  France,  the  Russian 
empire  will  sooner  or  later  come  to  possess  a  constitutional  repre- 
sentative government.  The  Czar  of  Russia  is  simply  fighting  the 
hopeless  battle  that  has  been  fought  and  lost  by  the  despotic 
sovereigns  of  every  other  European  country  —  a  battle  which  has 
the  same  invariable  issue,  the  triumph  of  liberal  principles  and  the 
admission  of  the  people  to  a  participation  in  the  government. 


700  GERMAN  FREEDOM  AND    UNITY. 


CHAPTER    LXI.     „ 

GERMAN  FREEDOM   AND   UNITY. 

Formation  of  the  German  Confederation  (1815).  —  The  German 
states,  thirty-nine  in  number,  were  reorganized  by  the  Congress  of 
Vienna  as  a  Confederation,  with  the  emperor  of  Austria  President 
of  the  league.  A  Diet  formed  of  representatives  of  the  several 
states  was  to  settle  all  questions  of  dispute  between  the  members 
of  the  Confederation,  and  determine  matters  of  general  concern. 
In  all  affairs  concerning  itself  alone,  each  state  was  to  retain  its 
independence.  It  might  carry  on  war  with  foreign  states,  or  enter 
into  alliance  with  them,  but  it  must  do  nothing  to  harm  any  mem- 
ber of  the  Confederation.  The  articles  of  union,  in  a  spirit  of 
concession  to  the  growing  sentiment  of  the  times,  provided  that 
all  sects  of  Christians  should  enjoy  equal  toleration,  and  that  every 
state  should  establish  a  constitutional  form  of  government. 

Under  this  scheme  of  union  Germany  was  to  rest  half  a  century 
—  until  1866.  Though  Austria  was  nominally  head  of  the  Con- 
federation, Prussia  was  actually  the  most  powerful  member  of  the 
league. 

The  Uprisings  of  1830 :  First  Step  towards  Freedom.  —  For  a 
long  time  previous  to  the  French  Revolution  there  had  been  grad- 
ually forming  among  the  German  people  a  double  sentiment  —  a 
longing  for  freedom  and  for  unity.  It  was  the  influence  of  the 
rising  patriotic  party  that  had  secured  the  provision  in  the  act  of 
confederation  which  required  that  all  the  princes  of  the  union 
should  give  their  states  a  representative  form  of  government.  But 
the  faces  of  these  rulers,  like  those  of  the  restored  Bourbons  in 
France,  were  turned  towards  the  past.  They  opposed  all  changes 
that  should  give  the  people  any  part  in  the  government,  and  clung 
to  the  old  order  of  things. 


THE   CUSTOMS   UNION.  701 

We  have  seen  what  was  the  consequence  of  the  reactionary 
policy  of  the  Bourbons  in  France,  —  how  in  1830  the  people  arose, 
drove  out  Charles  X.,  and  set  upon  the  throne  the  "  Citizen  King," 
Louis  Philippe.  Events  ran  exactly  the  same  course  in  Ger- 
many. The  princes  refused  or  neglected  to  carry  out  in  good  faith 
that  article  of  the  act  of  confederation  which  provided  for  repre- 
sentative governments  in  all  the  German  states.  The  natural 
result  was  widespread  discontent  among  the  people.  Conse- 
quently, when  the  French  Revolution  of  1830  occurred,  a  sympa- 
thetic thrill  shot  through  Germany,  and  in  places  the  popular  party 
made  threatening  demonstrations  against  their  tyrannical  rulers. 
The  princes  of  several  of  the  smaller  states  were  forced  to  give  to 
their  peoples  the  liberal  constitutions  that  were  demanded.  Thus 
a  little  was  gained  for  freedom,  though  after  the  flutter  of  the  revo- 
lutionary year  the  princes  again  took  up  their  retrograde  policy, 
and  did  all  in  their  power  to  check  the  popular  movement  and 
keep  governmental  matters  out  of  the  hands  of  the  people. 

The  Customs  Union :  First  Step  towards  Unity.  —  Just  about 
this  time  the  first  step  was  taken  towards  the  real  union  of  the 
German  states  through  the  formation  of  what  is  known  as  the  Cus- 
toms Union.  This  was  a  sort  of  commercial  treaty  binding  those 
states  that  became  parties  to  it,  and  eventually  all  the  states  save 
Austria  acceded  to  the  arrangement,  to  adopt  among  themselves 
the  policy  of  free  trade ;  that  is,  there  were  to  be  no  duties  levied 
on  goods  passing  from  one  state  of  the  Union  to  another  belonging 
to  it.  The  greatest  good  resulting  from  the  Union  was,  that  it 
taught  the  people  to  think  of  a  more  perfect  national  union.  And 
as  Prussia  was  a  prominent  promoter  and  the  centre  of  the  trade 
confederation,  it  accustomed  the  Germans  to  look  to  her  as  their 
head  and  chief. 

Uprising  of  1848:  a  Second  Step  towards  Freedom.  —  The 
history  of  Germany  from  the  uprising  of  1830  to  that  of  1848  may 
be  summarized  by  saying  that  during  all  these  years  the  people 
were  steadily  growing  more  and  more  earnest  in  their  demands  for 
liberal  forms  of  government,  while  the  princes,  strangely  blind  to 


702  GERMAN  FREEDOM  AND    UNITY. 

the  spirit  and  tendency  of  the  times,  were  stubbornly  refusing  all 
concessions  that  should  take  from  themselves  any  of  their  power 
as  absolute  rulers.  In  some  instances  the  constitutions  already 
granted  were  annulled,  or  their  articles  were  disregarded. 

Finally,  in  1848,  news  flew  across  the  Rhine,  of  the  uprising  in 
France  against  the  reactionary  government  of  Louis  Philippe,  and 
the  establishment  by  the  French  people  of  a. new  republic  (see 
p.  689).  The  intelligence  kindled  a  flame  of  excitement  through- 
out Germany.  The  liberal  party  everywhere  arose  and  demanded 
constitutional  government. 

Almost  all  of  the  princes  of  the  minor  states  yielded  to  the  pop- 
ular clamor,  and  straightway  adopted  the  liberal  measures  and 
instituted  the  reforms  demanded.  In  Austria  and  Prussia,  how- 
ever, the  popular  party  carried  their  point  only  after  demonstra- 
tions that  issued  in  bloodshed.  Prince  Metternich,  the  celebrated 
prime  minister  of  the  Emperor  of  Austria,  was  forced  to  flee  the 
country,  because  he  had  opposed  so  obstinately  all  the  demands 
of  the  Liberals. 

The  Revolution  of  1848  thus  effected  much  for  the  cause  of 
liberal  government  in  Germany.  The  movements  of  that  revolu- 
tionary year  brought  into  the  hands  of  the  people  much  more 
power  than  they  had  ever  before  exercised. 

Hungary :  Kossuth.  —  Meanwhile  the  Austrian  emperor  was 
having  serious  trouble  with  his  Hungarian  subjects.  Led  by  the 
distinguished  orator  Louis  Kossuth,  they  had  revolted,  and  de- 
clared their  independence.  A  memorable  struggle  now  followed 
( 1 848-1 849),  in  which  the  patriotic  Hungarians  made  a  noble 
fight  for  freedom,  but  were  at  last  overpowered  and  crushed  by 
the  combined  Austrian  and  Russian  armies.  Hungary  was  made 
a  second  Poland  (see  p.  693). 

Rivalry  between  Austria  and  Prussia.  —  While  the  attention  of 
Austria  was  directed  to  the  suppression  of  the  Hungarian  rebels, 
Prussia  proposed  a  plan  for  the  unification  of  Germany,  with  her- 
self as  the  head  of  the  body,  Austria  being  excluded  from  the  con- 
federation.    Several  of  the  states  joined  Prussia  in  this  move,  and 


THE   SEVEN   WEEKS'    WAR.  703 

an  alliance  called  the  "  German  Union "  was  formed.  Austria 
watched  with  the  greatest  concern  this  bold  move  of  her  rival  for 
leadership  in  German  affairs,  a  move  whereby  she  was  to  be  pushed 
aside  entirely,  and  just  as  soon  as  the  Hungarian  trouble  was  com- 
posed, she  made  a  counter-move  to  that  of  Prussia,  by  forming  a 
confederation  of  all  those  states  which  she  could  persuade  to  accept 
her  leadership. 

The  state  of  Germany  at  this  moment,  divided  between  the 
allies  of  Austria  and  those  of  Prussia,  may  be  likened  to  the  con- 
dition of  Greece  at  the  outbreak  of  the  Peloponnesian  War,  when 
the  Hellenic  states  had  grouped  themselves,  according  to  their 
sympathies,  about  Athens  and  Sparta.  It  does  not  require  a 
second  Pericles  to  see  war  lowering  in  the  horizon. 

The  Seven  Weeks'  War  between  Austria  and  Prussia  (1866). 
—  The  inevitable  war  which  was  to  decide  whether  Austria  or 
Prussia  should  be  leader  in  German  affairs  came  on  apace.  In 
the  year  1861,  Frederick  William  IV.  of  Prussia  died,  and  his 
brother,  already  an  old  man  of  sixty,  yet  destined  to  be  for  more 
than  a  score  of  years  the  central  figure  in  the  movement  for 
German  unity,  came  to  the  Prussian  throne  as  William  I.  (1861- 
1888).  He  soon  called  to  his  side  the  now  distinguished  Otto 
von  Bismarck  as  his  prime  minister,  a  man  of  wonderful  energy 
and  decision,  whose  policies  have  shaped  German  affairs  for  a 
quarter  of  a  century.  He  saw  clearly  enough  how  the  vexed  ques- 
tion between  Austria  and  Prussia  was  to  be  settled — "by  blood 
and  iron."  His  appearance  at  the  head  of  Prussian  affairs  marks 
an  epoch  in  history.  He  was  in  disposition  a  conservative  and 
despot,  and  the  liberal  party  distrusted  and  hated  him. 

Early  in  1866  the  war  opened,  the  occasion  of  it  being  a  dis- 
pute in  regard  to  some  petty  Danish  provinces  (Schleswig  and  Hol- 
stcin).  Almost  all  of  the  lesser  states  grouped  themselves  about 
Austria.  Prussia,  however,  found  a  ready  ally  in  Italy  (see  p. 
713),  which  served  to  divert  a  part  of  the  Austrian  forces.  Yet  it 
seemed  an  unequal  contest,  the  population  of  Prussia  at  this 
time  not  being  more  than  one-third  (19,000,000)  that  of  the  states 


704  GERMAN  FREEDOM  AND    UNITY. 

arrayed  against  her.  But  Bismarck  had  been  preparing  Prussia  for 
the  struggle  which  he  had  long  foreseen,  and  now  the  little  king- 
dom, with  the  best  disciplined  army  in  the  world,  headed  by  the 
great  commander  Von  Moltke,  was  to  astonish  the  world  by  a 
repetition  of  her  achievements  under  the  inspiration  of  Frederick 
the  Great. 

The  Prussian  armies,  numbering  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  mil- 
lion of  men,  began  to  move  about  the  middle  of  June.  Battle 
followed  battle  in  rapid  succession.  Almost  every  encounter 
proved  a  victory  for  the  Prussians.  On  the  third  of  July  was 
fought  the  great  battle  of  Sadowa,  in  Bohemia.  It  was  Austria's 
Waterloo.  The  emperor  was  forced  to  sue  for  peace,  and  on  the 
twenty-third  day  of  August  the  Peace  of  Prague  was  signed. 

The  long  debate  between  Austria  and  Prussia  was  over.  By  the 
terms  of  the  treaty  Austria  was  shut  out  from  participation  in  Ger- 
man affairs.     Prussia  was  now  without  a  rival  in  Germany. 

Establishment  of  the  North-German  Union  (1867).  —  Now 
quickly  followed  the  reorganization  of  the  northern  states  of 
Germany  into  what  was  called  the  North- German  Union,  under 
the  leadership  of  Prussia.  Prussia  was  to  have  command  of  the 
entire  military  force  of  the  several  states  composing  the  league, 
the  Prussian  king  being  President  of  the  Union.  A  constitution 
was  adopted  which  provided  that  the  affairs  of  the  confederation 
should  be  managed  by  a  Diet,  the  members  of  which  were  to  be 
chosen  by  the  different  states. 

Thus  was  a  long  step  taken  towards  German  unity.  Bismarck's 
policy  of  "  blood  and  iron,"  though  seemingly  rough  and  brutal, 
now  promised  to  prove  a  cure  indeed  for  all  of  Germany's  troubles. 
Though  so  much  had  been  effected,  there  was  still  remaining  much 
to  be  desired.  The  states  to  the  south  of  the  Main  —  Baden, 
Bavaria,  and  Wiirtemberg  —  were  yet  wanting  to  complete  the 
unification  of  the  Fatherland.  Many  patriots  both  north  and  south 
of  the  dividing  line  earnestly  desired  the  perfect  union  of  North 
and  South.  But  the  Catholics  of  the  southern  states  were  bitterly 
opposed  to  Prussia's  being  exalted  to  the  chief  place  in  Germany, 


THE  FRANCO-PRUSSIAN   WAR.  705 

because  she  was  Protestant,  while  many  of  the  democratic  party 
were  loth  to  see  Germany  reconstructed  under  the  supremacy  of 
Prussia  on  account  of  the  repressive  and  despotic  character  of  her 
government.  But  the  fervid  enthusiasm  awakened  by  another  suc- 
cessful war  serves  to  weld  the  states  of  both  North  and  South  into 
a  firm  and  close  union,  and  complete  the  work  of  Germany's 
unification. 

The  Franco-Prussian  War  (i 870-1871).  —  It  will  be  recalled 
with  what  jealousy  France  viewed  the  rise  to  power  of  the  House 
of  Hohenzollern  (see  p.  691).  All  of  her  old  bitter  hostility  to 
the  House  of  Austria  seems  to  have  been  transferred  to  her  success- 
ful rival  in  the  North.  So  when  in  1870  the  vacant  throne  of 
Spain  was  offered  to  Leopold,  a  member  of  the  Hohenzollern  fam- 
ily, the  Emperor  Napoleon  III.  affected  to  see  in  this  a  scheme 
on  the  part  of  the  House  of  Hohenzollern  to  unite  the  interests  of 
Prussia  and  of  Spain,  just  as  Austria  and  Spain  were  united,  with 
such  disastrous  consequences  to  the  peace  of  Europe,  under  the 
princes  of  the  House  of  Hapsburg.  Even  after  Leopold,  to  avoid 
displeasing  France,  had  declined  the  proffered  crown,  the  Emperor 
Napoleon  demanded  of  King  William  assurance  that  no  member 
of  the  House  of  Hohenzollern  should  ever  become  a  candidate  for 
the  Spanish  throne.  The  demand  was  rudely  made,  was  refused, 
and  the  two  nations  rushed  together  in  a  struggle  which  was  des- 
tined to  prove  terribly  disastrous  to  France,  and  memorable  to 
Germany  for  the  glory  and  unity  it  won  for  her. 

The  important  thing  for  us  to  notice  here  is  the  enthusiasm 
that  the  war  awakened  not  only  throughout  the  states  of  the 
North-German  Confederation,  but  among  the  states  of  the  South 
as  well,  which  placed  their  armies  at  the  disposal  of  King  William. 
The  cause  was  looked  upon  as  a  national  one,  and  a  patriotic  fer- 
vor stirred  the  hearts  of  all  Germans  alike. 

Establishment  of  the  New  German  Empire  (1871). — The 
astonishing  successes  of  the  German  armies  on  French  soil  (see 
p.  691)  created  among  Germans  everywhere  such  patriotic  pride 
in  the  Fatherland,  that  all  the  obstacles  which  had  hitherto  pre- 


706 


GERMAN  FREEDOM  AND    UNITY. 


vented  anything  more  than  a  partial  union  of  the  members  of  the 
Germanic  body  were  now  swept  out  of  the  way  by  an  irresistible 
tide  of  national  sentiment.  While  the  siege  of  Paris  was  progress- 
ing, commissioners  were  sent  by  the  southern  states  to  Versailles,  the 
headquarters  of  King  William,  to  represent  to  him  that  they  were 


PROCLAMATION    OF   KING    WILLIAM    AS    EMPEROR    OF   GERMANY, 

AT   VERSAILLES,    JANUARY,    1871. 

(By  Anion   von    Werner,   Prussian  Court  Painter.) 

ready  and  anxious  to  enter  the  North-German  Union.  Thus  in 
rapid  succession  Baden,  Bavaria,  and  Wlirtemberg  were  received 
into  the  Confederation,  the  name  of  which  was  now  changed  to 
that  of  the  German  Confederation. 

'  dy  was  this  accomplished,  when,  upon  the  suggestion  of 


ESTABLISHMENT  OF  THE  NEW  GERMAN  EMPIRE.     707 

the  king  of  Bavaria,  King  William,  who  now  bore  the  title  of  Pres- 
ident of  the  Confederation,  was  given  the  title  of  German  Em- 
peror, which  honor  was  to  be  hereditary  in  his  family.  On  the 
1 8th  of  January,  1871,  within  the  Palace  of  Versailles,  —  the  siege 
of  Paris  being  still  in  progress,  —  amidst  indescribable  enthusiasm, 
the  Imperial  dignity  was  formally  conferred  upon  King  William, 
and  Germany  became  a  constitutional  Empire. 

Thus  amidst  the  throes  of  war  the  free  German  nation  was  born. 
The  German  people,  after  long  centuries  of  division  and  servitude, 
had  at  last  found  Freedom  and  Unity. 


708  LIBERATION  AND    UNIFICATION  OF  ITALY. 


CHAPTER    LXII. 

LIBERATION   AND   UNIFICATION   OF   ITALY. 

Italy  at  the  Downfall  of  Napoleon.  —  The  Italian  people,  as 
being  the  most  dangerously  infected  with  the  ideas  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, were,  by  the  reactionary  Congress  of  Vienna,  condemned  to 
the  most  strict  and  ignominious  slavery.  The  former  common- 
wealths were  forbidden  to  restore  their  ancient  institutions,  while 
the  petty  principalities  were  handed  over  in  almost  every  case  to 
the  tyrants  or  the  heirs  of  the  tyrants  who  had  ruled  them  before 
the  Revolution.  Austria  appropriated  Venetia  and  Lombardy,  and 
from  Northern  Italy  assumed  to  direct  the  affairs  of  the  whole 
peninsula.  Tuscany,  Modena,  Parma,  and  Piacenza  were  given  to 
princes  of  the  House  of  Hapsburg.  Naples  was  restored  to  its  old 
Bourbon  rulers.  The  Pope  and  Victor  Emmanuel  I.,  king  of  Sar- 
dinia, were  the  only  native  rulers. 

"  Italy  was  divided  on  the  map,  but  she  had  made  up  her  mind 
to  be  one."  The  Revolution  had  sown  the  seeds  of  Liberty,  and 
time  only  was  needed  for  their  maturing.  The  Cisalpine,  the  Ligu- 
rian,  the  Parthenopsean,  the  Tiberine  republics  (see  pp.  668,  670), 
short-lived  though  they  were,  had  awakened  in  the  people  an  aspi- 
ration for  self-government;  while  Napoleon's  kingdom  of  Italy 
(see  p.  676,  n.),  though  equally  delusive,  had  nevertheless  inspired 
thousands  of  Italian  patriots  with  the  sentiment  of  national  unity. 
Thus  the  French  Revolution,  disappointing  as  seemed  its  issue, 
really  imparted  to  Italy  her  first  impulse  in  the  direction  of  free- 
dom and  of  national  organization. 

Arbitrary  Rule  of  the  Restored  Princes.  — The  setting  up  of 
the  overturned  thrones  meant,  of  course,  the  re-instating  of  the 
old  tyrannies.  The  restored  despots  came  back  with  an  impla- 
cable hatred  of  everything  French.     They  swept  away  all  French 


THE   CARBONARI.  709 

institutions  that  were  supposed  to  tend  in  the  least  to  Liberalism. 
At  Rome  even  vaccination  and  street-lamps,  French  innovations, 
were  abolished.  In  Sardinia,  nothing  that  bore  the  French  stamp, 
nothing  that  had  been  set  up  by  French  hands,  was  allowed  to 
remain.  Even  the  French  furniture  in  the  royal  palace  at  Turin 
was  thrown  out  of  the  windows,  and  the  French  plants  in  the 
royal  gardens  were  pulled  up  root  and  branch. 

The  Carbonari :  Uprising  of  1820-1821.  —  The  natural  results 
of  the  arbitrary  rule  and  retrogressive  policy  of  the  restored  princes 
was  deep  and  widespread  discontent.  The  French  Revolution,  as 
we  have  said,  had  sown  broadcast  in  Italy  the  seeds  of  liberty,  and 
their  growth  could  not  be  checked  by  the  repressions  of  tyranny. 
An  old  secret  organization,  the  members  of  which  were  known  as 
the  Carbonari  (charcoal-burners),  formed  the  nucleus  about  which 
gathered  the  elements  of  disaffection. 

In  1820,  incited  by  a  revolution  in  Spain,  the  Carbonari  raised 
an  insurrection  in  Naples,  and  forced  King  Ferdinand,  who  was 
ruler  of  both  Naples  and  Sicily,  now  united  under  the  name  of  the 
Kingdom  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  to  grant  his  Neapolitan  subjects  what 
was  known  as  the  Spanish  Constitution  of  181 2.  But  Prince  Met- 
ternich  (see  p.  702),  who  had  been  watching  the  doings  of  the  Lib- 
eral party  in  Naples,  interfered  to  mar  their  plans.  He  reasoned 
that  Lombardy  and  Venetia  could  be  kept  free  from  the  contagion 
of  Liberalism  only  by  the  stamping  out  of  the  infection  wherever 
else  in  Italy  it  might  show  itself.  Hence  60,000  Austrian  troops 
were  sent  to  crush  the  revolutionists.  Ferdinand  was  re-instated 
in  his  former  absolute  authority,  and  everything  was  put  back  on 
the  old  footing. 

Meanwhile  a  similar  revolution  was  running  its  course  in  Pied- 
mont. King  Victor  Emmanuel  I.,  rather  than  yield  to  the  de- 
mands of  his  people  for  a  constitutional  government,  gave  up  his 
crown,  and  was  succeeded  by  his  brother  Charles  Felix,  who,  by 
threatening  to  call  to  his  aid  the  Austrian  army,  compelled  his  sub- 
jects to  cease  their  clamor  about  kings  ruling,  not  by  the  grace  of 
God,  but  by  the  will  of  the  people. 


710  LIBERATION  AND    UNIFICATION  OF  ITALY. 

The  Revolution  of  1830-1831.  —  For  just  ten  years  all  Italy  lay 
in  sullen  vassalage  to  Austria.  Then  the  revolutionary  years  of 
1830-31  witnessed  a  repetition  of  the  scenes  of  1820-21.  The 
revolution  in  France  which  placed  Louis  Philippe  upon  the  French 
throne  (see  p.  688)  sent  a  tremor  of  excitement  and  hope  through 
all  Italy.  The  centre  of  the  revolution  was  the  Papal  States.  But 
the  presence  of  Austrian  troops,  who,  "  true  to  their  old  principle 
of  hurrying  with  their  extinguishers  to  any  spot  in  Italy  where  a 
crater  opened,"  had  poured  into  Central  Italy,  resulted  in  the 
speedy  quenching  of  the  flames  of  the  insurrection. 

The  Three  Parties :  Plans  for  National  Organization.  —  Twice 
now  had  Austrian  armies  crushed  the  aspirations  of  the  Italians 
after  national  unity  and  freedom.  Italian  hatred  of  these  foreign 
intermeddlers  who  were  causing  them  to  miss  their  destiny,  grew 
ever  more  intense,  and  "  death  to  the  Germans  "  became  the  watch- 
cry  that  united  all  the  peoples  of  the  peninsula. 

But  while  united  in  their  deadly  hatred  of  the  Austrians,  the 
Italians  were  divided  in  their  views  respecting  the  best  plan  for  na- 
tional organization.  One  party,  known  as  "Young  Italy,"  founded 
and  inspired  by  the  patriot  Joseph  Mazzini,  wanted  a  republic ; 
another  party  wanted  a  confederation  of  the  various  states,  with 
the  Pope  as  chief;  while  still  a  third  wished  to  see  Italy  a  con- 
stitutional monarchy,  with  the  king  of  Sardinia  at  its  head. 

The  Revolution  of  1848-1849.  — After  the  suppression  of  the 
uprising  of  1830,  until  the  approach  of  the  momentous  year  of 
1848,  Italy  lay  restless  under  the  heel  of  her  oppressor.  The 
republican  movements  throughout  the  continent  of  Europe  which 
characterized  that  year  of  revolutions,  inspired  the  Italian  patriots 
to  make  another  attempt  to  achieve  independence  and  nationality. 
Everywhere  throughout  the  peninsula  they  rose  against  their  des- 
potic rulers,  and  forced  them  to  grant  constitutions  and  institute 
reforms.  But  through  the  intervention  of  the  Austrians  and  the 
French  *  the  third  Italian  revolution  was  thwarted.     By  the  autumn 

1This  interference  by  the  French  in  Italian  affairs  was  instigated  by  their 
jealousy  of  Austria,  and  by  th*e  anxious  desire  of  Louis  Napoleon  to  win  the 
good-will  of  the  Catholic  clergy  in  France. 


VICTOR  EMMANUEL.  711 

of  the  year  1 849  the  Liberals  were  everywhere  crushed,  their  lead- 
ers executed,  imprisoned,  or  driven  into  exile,  and  the  dream  of 
Italy's  unity  and  freedom  dispelled  by  the  hard  present  fact  of 
renewed  tyranny  and  foreign  domination. 

Much,  however,  had  been  gained.  The  patriotic  party  had  had 
revealed  to  itself  its  strength,  and  at  the  same  time  the  necessity 
of  united  action,  —  of  the  adoption  of  a  single  policy.  Henceforth 
the  Republicans  and  Federalists  were  more  inclined  to  give  up  as 
impracticable  their  plans  of  national  organization,  and  with  the 
Constitutionalists  to  look  upon  the  kingdom  of  Sardinia  as  the 
only  possible  basis  and  nucleus  of  a  free  and  united  Italy. 

Victor  Emmanuel  II.,  Count  Cavour,  and  Garibaldi.  —  Sardinia 
was  a  state  which  had  gradually  grown  into  power  in  the  northwest 
corner  of  the  peninsula.  The  throne  was  at  this  time  held  by 
Victor  Emmanuel  II.  (1 849-1 878).  To  him  it  was  that  the  hopea 
of  the  Italian  patriots  now  turned.  Nor  were  these  hopes  to  be 
disappointed.  Victor  Emmanuel  was  the  destined  liberator  of 
Italy,  or  perhaps  it  would  be  more  correct  to  say  that  his  was  the 
name  in  which  the  achievement  was  to  be  effected  by  the  wise 
policy  of  his  great  minister  Count  Cavour,  and  the  reckless  daring 
of  the  hero  Garibaldi. 

Count  Cavour  was  a  man  of  large  hopes  and  large  plans.  His 
single  aim  and  purpose  was  the  independence  and  unification  of 
Italy.  He  was  the  genius  of  Italian  liberty.  Garibaldi,  "  the  hero 
of  the  red  shirt,"  was  the  knight-errant  of  Italian  independence. 
Though  yet  barely  past  middle  life,  he  had  led  a  career  singularly 
crowded  with  varied  experiences  and  romantic  adventures.  Be- 
cause of  his  violent  republicanism,  he  had  already  been  twice 
exiled  from  Italy. 

The  Austro-Sardinian  War  (1 859-1 860).  —  The  hour  for  strik- 
ing another  blow  for  the  freedom  of  Italy  had  now  arrived.  In 
1859  Count  Cavour,  in  the  pursuance  of  his  national  policy  for  Italy, 
having  first  made  a  secret  arrangement  with  the  French  emperor, 
gave  Austria  to  understand  that  unless  she  granted  Lombardy  and 
Venetia  free  government  and  ceased  to  interfere  in  the  affairs  of 


712  LIBERA  TION  AND    UNIFICA  TION  OF  ITAL  Y. 

the  rest  of  Italy,  Sardinia  would  declare  war  against  her.  Of 
course  the  Austrian  government  refused  to  accede  to  the  demand, 
and  almost  immediately  war  followed.  The  French  emperor, 
actuated  probably  less  by  gratitude  for  the  aid  of  the  Sardinian 
contingent  in  the  Crimean  struggle  (see  p.  726)-  than  by  jealousy 
of  Austria  and  the  promise  of  Savoy  and  Nice  in  case  of  a  suc- 
cessful issue  of  the  war,  supported  the  Sardinians  with  the  armies 
of  France.  The  two  great  victories  of  Magenta  and  Solferino 
seemed  to  promise  to  the  allies  a  triumphant  march  to  the 
Adriatic.  But  just  now  the  threatening  attitude  of  Prussia  and 
other  German  states,  in  connection  with  other  considerations,  led 
Napoleon  to  enter  upon  negotiations  of  peace  with  the  Austrian 
emperor  at  Villafranca. 

The  outcome  was  that  Austria  retained  Venice,  but  gave  up  to 
Sardinia  the  larger  part  of  Lombardy.  The  Sardinians  were  bit- 
terly disappointed  that  they  did  not  get  Venetia,  and  loudly  ac- 
cused the  French  emperor  of  having  betrayed  their  cause,  since  at 
the  outset  he  had  promised  them  that  he  would  free  Italy  from  the 
mountains  to  the  sea.  But  Sardinia  found  compensation  for  Ven- 
ice in  the  accession  of  Tuscany,  Modena,  Parma,  and  Romagna, 
the  peoples  of  which  states,  having  discarded  their  old  rulers,  be- 
sought Victor  Emmanuel  to  permit  them  to  unite  themselves  to 
his  kingdom.  Thus,  as  the  result  of  the  war,  the  king  of  Sardinia 
had  added  to  his  subjects  a  population  of  9,000,000.  One  long 
step  was  taken  in  the  way  of  Italian  unity  and  freedom. 

Sicily  and  Naples  added  to  Victor  Emmanuel's  Kingdom 
(i860).  —  The  romantic  and  adventurous  daring  of  the  hero  Gar- 
ibaldi now  added  Sicily  and  Naples  to  the  possessions  of  Victor 
Emmanuel,  and  changed  the  kingdom  of  Sardinia  into  the  king- 
dom of  Italy. 

The  king  of  Naples  and  Sicily,  Francis  II.,  was  a  typical  despot. 
In  i860  his  subjects  rose  in  revolt.  Victor  Emmanuel  and  his 
minister  Cavour  were  in  sympathy  with  the  movement,  yet  dared 
not  send  the  insurgents  aid  through  fear  of  arousing  the  jealousy 
of  Austria  and  of  France.  But  Garibaldi,  untrammelled  by  any 
such  considerations,  having  gathered  a  band  of  a  thousand  or  more 


VENETIA  ADDED    TO    THE  KINGDOM.  713 

volunteers,  set  sail  from  Genoa  for  Sicily,  where  upon  landing  he 
assumed  the  title  of  Dictator  of  Sicily  for  Victor  Emmanuel,  King 
of  Italy,  and  quickly  drove  the  troops  of  King  Francis  out  of  the 
island.  Then  crossing  to  the  mainland,  he  marched  triumphantly 
to  Naples,  whose  inhabitants  hailed  him  tumultously  as  their  De- 
liverer. 

The  Neapolitans  and  Sicilians  now  voted  almost  unanimously 
for  annexation  to  the  Sardinian  kingdom.  The  hero  Garibaldi, 
having  first  met  and  hailed  his  Sovereign  "  King  of  Italy,"  surren- 
dered his  dictatorship,  and  retired  to  the  island  of  Capri,  in  the 
bay  of  Naples.     He  had  earned  the  lasting  gratitude  of  his  country. 

Thus  was  another  great  step  taken  in  the  unification  of  Italy. 
Nine  millions  more  of  Italians  had  become  the  subjects  of  Victor 
Emmanuel.  There  was  now  wanting  to  the  complete  union  of 
Italy  only  Venetia  and  the  Papal  territories. 

Venetia  added  to  the  Kingdom  (1866).  —  The  Seven  Weeks' 
War  which  broke  out  between  Prussia  and  Austria  in  1866  afforded 
the  Italian  patriots  the  opportunity  for  which  they  were  watching 
to  make  Venetia  a  part  of  the  kingdom  of  Italy.  Victor  Emman- 
uel formed  an  alliance  with  the  king  of  Prussia,  one  of  the  condi- 
tions of  which  was  that  no  peace  should  be  made  with  Austria 
until  she  had  surrendered  Venetia  to  Italy.  The  speedy  issue  of 
the  war  added  the  coveted  territory  to  the  dominions  of  Victor 
Emmanuel.  Rome  alone  was  now  lacking  to  the  complete  unifi- 
cation of  Italy. 

Rome  becomes  the  Capital  (1870).  —  After  the  liberation  of 
Naples  and  Sicily  the  city  of  Turin,  the  old  capital  of  the  Sardinian 
kingdom,  was  made  the  capital  of  the  new  kingdom  of  Italy.  In 
1865  the  seat  of  government  was  transferred  to  Florence.  But  the 
Italians  looked  forward  to  the  time  when  Rome,  the  ancient  mis- 
tress of  the  peninsula  and  of  the  world,  should  be  their  capital. 
The  power  of  the  Pope,  however,  was  upheld  by  the  French,  and 
this  made  it  impossible  for  the  Italians  to  have  their  will  in  this 
matter  without  a  conflict  with  France. 

But  events  soon  gave  the  coveted  capital  to  the  Italian  govern- 
ment.    In  1870  came  the  sharp,  quick  war  between  France  and 


714  LIBERATION  AND   UNIFICATION  OF  ITALY. 

Prussia,  and  the  French  troops  at  Rome  were  hastily  summoned 
home.  Upon  the  overthrow  of  the  French  Monarchy  and  the 
establishment  of  the  Republic,  Victor  Emmanuel  was  informed 
that  France  would  no  longer  sustain  the  Papal  power.  The  Italian 
government  at  once  gave  notice  to  the  Pope  that  Rome  would 
henceforth  be  considered  a  portion  of  the  kingdom  of  Italy,  and 
forthwith  an  Italian  army  entered  the  city,  which  by  a  vote  of 
133,681  to  1,507  joined  itself  to  the  Italian  nation.  The  family  was 
now  complete.  Rome  was  the  capital  of  a  free  and  united  Italy. 
July  2,  1871,  Victor  Emmanuel1  himself  entered  the  city  and  took 
up  his  residence  there. 

End  of  the  Temporal  Power  of  the  Pope. —Through  the  ex- 
tension of  the  authority  of  the  Italian  government  over  the  Papal 
states,  the  Pope  was  despoiled  of  the  last  vestige  of  that  tem- 
poral power  wherewith  Pepin  and  Charlemagne  had  invested  the 
Bishops  of  Rome  more  than  a  thousand  years  before  (see  p.  404). 
The  Papal  troops  were  disbanded,  but  the  Pope,  Pius  IX.,  still 
retained  all  his  spiritual  authority,  the  Vatican  with  its  11,000 
chambers  being  reserved  to  him  as  a  place  of  residence.  Just 
a  few  months  before  the  loss  of  his  temporal  sovereignty  a  great 
Ecumenical  Council  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  had  proclaimed 
the  doctrine  of  Papal  Infallibility,  which  declares  decrees  of  the 
Pope  "  on  questions  of  faith  and  morals  "  to  be  infallible. 

Conclusion.  —  Although  there  has  been  much  antagonism  be- 
tween the  Vatican  and  the  Quirinal,  that  is,  between  the  Pope  and 
the  Italian  government,  still  reform  and  progress  have  marked 
Italian  affairs  since  the  events  of  1870.  A  public  system  of  edu- 
cation has  been  established;  brigandage  has  been  suppressed; 
agriculture  has  been  encouraged ;  while  the  naval  and  military 
resources  of  the  peninsula  have  been  developed  to  such  an  extent 
that  Italy,  so  recently  the  prey  of  foreign  sovereigns,  of  petty  native 
tyrants,  and  of  adventurers,  is  now  justly  regarded  as  one  of  the 
great  powers  of  Europe. 

1  In  the  early  part  of  the  year  1878  Victor  Emmanuel  died,  and  his  son 
came  to  the  throne,  with  the  title  of  Humbert  I.,  the  second  king  of  Italy. 


THE    THREE    CHIEF  MATTERS.  715 


QUEEN    VICTORIA   ON   THE   DAY   OF   HER    CORONATION. 

CHAPTER   LXIII. 

ENGLAND   SINCE  THE  CONGRESS  OF  VIENNA. 

The  Three  Chief  Matters.  —  English  history  since  the  close  of 
the  Napoleonic  wars  embraces  a  multitude  of  events.  A  short 
chapter  covering  the  entire  period  will  possess  no  instructive  value 
unless  it  reduces  the  heterogeneous  mass  of  facts  to  some  sort  of 
unity  by  placing  events  in  relation  with  their  causes,  and  thus 
showing  how  they  are  connected  with  a  few  broad  national  move- 
ments or  tendencies. 

Studying  the  period  in  this  way,  we  shall  find  that  very  many  of 
its  leading  events  may  be  summed  up  under  the  three  following 
heads:  i.  Progress  towards  democracy;  2.  Expansion  of  the 
principle  of  religious  equality ;  3.  Growth  of  the  British  Empire  in 
the  East. 

1.  Progress  towards  Democracy. 

Effects  of  the  French  Revolution  upon  Liberalism  in  Eng- 
land. —  The  French  Revolution  at  first  gave  a  fresh  impulse  to 
liberal  tendencies  in  England.    The  English  Liberals  watched  the 


716        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE  CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

course  of  the  French  Republicans  with  the  deepest  interest  and 
sympathy.  It  will  be  recalled  how  the  statesman  Fox  rejoiced  at 
the  fall  of  the  Bastile,  and  what  auguries  of  hope  he  saw  in  the 
event  (see  p.  652).  The  young  writers  Coleridge,  Wordsworth, 
and  Southey  were  all  in  sympathy  with  democratic  sentiments,  and 
inspired  with  a  generous  enthusiasm  for  political  liberty  and 
equality.  But  the  wild  excesses  of  the  French  Levellers  terrified 
the  English  Liberals.  There  was  a  sudden  revulsion  of  feeling. 
Liberal  sentiments  were  denounced  as  dangerous  and  revolu- 
tionary. 

But  in  a  few  years  after  the  downfall  of  Napoleon,  the  terrors  of 
the  French  Revolution  were  forgotten.  Liberal  sentiments  began 
to  spread  among  the  masses.  The  people  very  justly  complained 
that,  while  the  English  government  claimed  to  be  a  government 
of  the  people,  they  had  no  part  in  it.1 

Now,  it  is  instructive  to  note  the  different  ways  in  which  Liber- 
alism was  dealt  with  by  the  English  government  and  by  the  rulers 
on  the  continent.  In  the  continental  countries  the  rising  spirit 
of  democracy  was  met  by  cruel  and  despotic  repressions.  The 
people  were  denied  by  their  rulers  all  participation  in  the  affairs 
of  government.  We  have  seen  the  result.  Liberalism  triumphed 
indeed  at  last,  but  triumphed  only  through  Revolution. 

In  England,  the  government  did  not  resist  the  popular  demands 
to  the  point  of  Revolution.  It  made  timely  concessions  to  the  grow- 
ing spirit  of  democracy.  Hence  here,  instead  of  a  series  of  rev- 
olutions, we  have  a  series  of  reform  measures,  which,  gradually 
popularizing  the  House  of  Commons,  at  last  renders  the  English 
nation  not  alone  in  name,  but  in  reality,  a  self-governing  people. 

The  Beform  Bill  of   1832.  — The  first  Parliamentary  step  in 

1  The  English  Revolution  of  1688  transferred  authority  from  the  king  to 
the  Parliament.  The  elective  branch  of  that  body,  however,  rested  upon  a 
very  narrow  electoral  basis.  Out  of  5,000,000  Englishmen  who  should  have 
had  a  voice  in  the  government,  not  more  than  160,000  were  voters,  and  these 
were  chiefly  of  the  rich  upper  classes.  At  the  opening  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury the  number  of  electors  in  Scotland  did  not  exceed  3000. 


THE  REFORM  BILL   OF  1832.  717 

reform  was  taken  in  1832.  To  understand  this  important  act,  a 
retrospective  glance  becomes  necessary. 

When,  in  1265,  the  Commons  were  first  admitted  to  Parliament 
(see  p.  480),  members  were  called  only  from  those  cities  and  bor- 
oughs whose  wealth  and  population  fairly  entitled  them  to  represen- 
tation. In  the  course  of  time  some  of  these  places  dwindled  in 
population,  and  new  towns  sprang  up  :  yet  the  decayed  boroughs 
retained  their  ancient  privilege  of  sending  members  to  Parliament, 
while  the  new  towns  were  left  entirely  without  representation.  Thus 
Old  Sarum,  an  ancient  town  now  utterly  decayed  and  without  a 
single  inhabitant,  was  represented  in  the  Commons  by  two  mem- 
bers. Furthermore,  the  sovereign,  for  the  purpose  of  gaining  influ- 
ence in  the  Commons,  had,  from  time  to  time,  given  unimportant 
places  the  right  of  returning  members  to  the  Lower  House.  In  1 793 
less  than  200  electors,  or  voters,  sent  to  the  Commons  197  members. 
Of  course,  elections  in  these  small  or  "  pocket  boroughs,"  as  they 
were  called,  were  almost  always  determined  by  the  corrupt  influence 
of  the  crown  or  of  the  resident  lords.  The  Lower  House  of  Parlia- 
ment was  thus  filled  with  the  nominees  of  the  king,  or  some  great 
lord,  or  with  persons  who  had  bought  the  office,  often  witlv  little 
effort  at  concealment.  At  the  same  time,  such  large,  recently 
grown  manufacturing  towns  as  Birmingham  and  Manchester  had 
no  representation  at  all  in  the  Commons. 

Agitation  was  begun  for  the  reform  of  this  corrupt  and  farcical 
system  of  representation.  The  contest  between  the  Whigs  and 
the  Tories,  or  Liberals  and  Conservatives,  was  long  and  bitter. 
The  Conservatives  of  course  opposed  all  reform.  Bill  after  bill 
was  introduced  into  Parliament  to  correct  the  evil,  but  most  of 
these,  after  having  passed  the  Commons,  were  lost  in  the  House 
of  Lords.  At  last  the  public  feeling  became  so  strong  and  violent 
that  the  lords  were  forced  to  yield,  and  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832 
became  a  law.1 

By  this  act  the  electoral  system  of  the  kingdom  was  radically 

1  The  popularizing  of  the  House  of  Commons  led  to  a  series  of  acts  of  a 
popular  character.     Among  them  was  an  act  (in  1833)  for  the  abolition  of 


71S        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OE    VIENNA. 

changed.  Fifty-six  of  the  "  rotten  boroughs  "  were  disfranchised, 
and  the  143  seats  in  the  Lower  House  which  they  had  filled  were 
given  to  different  counties  and  large  towns.  The  bill  also  greatly 
increased  the  number  of  electors  by  extending  the  right  of  voting 
to  all  persons  owning  or  leasing  property  of  a  certain  value.  We 
can  scarcely  exaggerate  the  importance  of  this  Reform  Bill. 

Chartism :  the  Revolutionary  Year  of  1848.  —  But  while  the 
Reform  bill  of  1832  was  almost  revolutionary  in  the  principle  it 
established,  it  went  only  a  little  way  in  the  application  of  the 
principle.  It  admitted  to  the  franchise  the  middle  classes  only. 
The  great  laboring  class  were  given  no  part  in  the  government. 
They  now  began  an  agitation,  characterized  by  much  bitterness, 
known  as  Chartism,  from  a  document  called  the  "  People's  Char- 
ter," which  embodied  the  reforms  they  desired.  These  were 
"  universal  suffrage,  vote  by  ballot,  annual  parliaments,  the  division 
of  the  country  into  equal  electoral  districts,  the  abolition  of  the 
property  qualifications  of  members,  and  payment  for  their  services." 

The  agitation  for  these  changes  in  the  constitution  went  on  with 
more  or  less  violence  until  1848.  That  year  the  Chartists,  en- 
couraged by  the  revolutions  then  shaking  almost  every  throne 
on  the  European  continent,  indulged  in  riotous  demonstrations 
which  frightened  the  law-abiding  citizens,  and  brought  discredit 
upon  themselves.  Their  organization  now  fell  to  pieces.  The 
reforms,  however,  which  they  had  labored  to  secure,  were,  in  the 
main,  desirable  and  just,  and  the  most  important  of  them  have 
since  been  adopted  and  made  a  part  of  the  English  Constitution. 

The  Reform  Bill  of  1867.  —The  Reform  Bill  of  1867  was  sim- 
ply another  step  taken  by  the  English  government  in  the  direction 
of  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832.  Like  that  measure,  it  was  passed  only 
after  long  and  violent  agitation  and  discussion  both  without  and 
within  the  walls  of  Parliament.  Its  main  effect  was  the  extension 
of  the  right  of  voting,  —  the  enfranchisement  of  the  great  "  fourth 
estate,  or  the  masses."     By  it  also  a  few  small  boroughs  in  Eng- 

slavery  throughout  the  British  colonies.  780,993  slaves  in  the  British  West 
Indies  were  freed  at  a  cost  to  the  English  nation  of  ,£20,000,000. 


THE  REFORM  BILL    OF  1S84.  719 

land  —  for  the  bill  did  not  concern  either  Ireland  or  Scotland,  sep- 
arate bills  of  somewhat  similar  provisions  being  framed  for  them 
—  were  disfranchised,  and  several  new  ones  created. 

The  Reform  Bill  of  1884.  —  One  of  the  conservative  leaders, 
the  Earl  of  Derby,  in  the  discussions  upon  the  Reform  Bill  of  1867, 
said,  "  No  doubt  we  are  making  a  great  experiment,  and  taking  a 
leap  in  the  dark."  Just  seventeen  years  after  the  passage  of  that 
bill,  the  English  people  were  ready  to  take  another  leap.  But  they 
were  not  now  leaping  in  the  dark.  The  wisdom  and  safety  of 
admitting  the  lower  classes  to  a  participation  in  the  government 
had  been  demonstrated. 

In  1884  Mr.  Gladstone,  then  prime  minister,  introduced  and 
pushed  to  a  successful  vote  a  new  reform  bill,  more  radical  and 
sweeping  in  its  provisions  than  any  preceding  one.  It  increased 
the  number  of  voters  from  about  3,000,000  to  about  5,000,000. 
The  qualification  of  voters  in  the  counties  was  made  the  same  as 
that  required  of  voters  in  the  boroughs.  Hence  its  effect  was  to 
enfranchise  the  great  agricultural  classes. 

Only  the  Forms  of  Monarchy  remain.  —  The  English  govern- 
ment is  now  in  reality  as  democratic  as  our  own.  Only  the  forms 
of  monarchy  remain.  It  does  not  seem  probable  that  these  can 
long  withstand  the  encroachments  of  democracy.  Hereditary 
privilege,  as  represented  by  the  House  of  Lords  and  the  Crown,  is 
likely  soon  to  be  abolished. 

Home  Rule  for  Ireland.  —  In  connection  with  the  above  out- 
line of  the  democratic  movement  in  England,  a  word  must  be  said 
about  the  so-called  Home  Rule  movement  in  Ireland. 

The  legislative  independence  secured  by  Ireland  in  1782  (see 
p.  632),  was  maintained  only  a  short  time.  In  1798,  England  be- 
ing then  engaged  in  war  with  the  revolutionists  of  France,  the 
Irish  rose  in  revolt,  with  the  purpose  of  setting  up  an  Irish  re- 
public. The  uprising  was  quelled,  and  then  as  a  measure  of 
security  the  Irish  Parliament  was  abolished  (1801)  and  Ireland 
given  representation  in  the  English  Parliament,  just  as  had  been 
done  in  the  case  of  Scotland  at  the  time  of  the  legislative  union  of 
England  and  Scotland  (see  p.  629). 


720        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE   CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

The  Irish  patriots  bitterly  resented  this  extinction  of  the  legis- 
lative independence  of  Ireland,  and  denounced  as  traitors  those 
members  of  the  last  Irish  Parliament  who,  corrupted  by  the  English 
minister,  William  Pitt  (the  younger),  had  voted  away  Irish  liberties. 
Consequently  from  the  day  of  the  Union  to  the  present,  there  has 
been  more  or  less  agitation  for  its  repeal  and  the  re-establishment 
of  the  old  Irish  Parliament.  In  1841,  under  the  inspiration  of  the 
eloquent  Daniel  O'Connell,  Ireland  was  brought  to  the  verge  of 
insurrection,  but  the  movement  was  suppressed.  In  1886  Mr. 
Gladstone,  their  prime  minister,  introduced  a  bill  in  Parliament, 
granting  a  separate  legislation  to  Ireland.  This  led  to  bitter  debate 
both  within  and  without  the  walls  of  Parliament,  and  at  the  present 
time  (1889),  the  question  of  Home  Rule  for  Ireland  is  the  leading 
issue  in  English  politics.1 

2.  Expansion  of  the  Principle  of  Religious  Equality. 

Religious  Freedom  and  Religious  Equality.  —  Alongside  the 
political  movement  traced  in  the  preceding  section  has  run  a 
similar  one  in  the  religious  realm.  This  is  a  growing  recognition 
by  the  English  people  of  the  true  principle  of  religious  toleration. 

At  the  opening  of  the  nineteenth  century  there  was  in  England 
religious  freedom,  but  no  religious  equality.  That  is  to  say,  one 
might  be  a  Catholic  or  a  dissenter,  if  he  chose  to  be,  without 
fear  of  persecution.  Dissent  from  the  Established  Church  was 
not  unlawful.  But  one's  being  a  dissenter  disqualified  him  from 
holding  certain  public  offices.  Where  there  exists  such  discrimi- 
nation against  any  religious  sect,  or  where  any  one  sect  is  favored 
or  sustained  by  the  government,  there  of  course  is  no  religious 
equality,  although  there  may  be  religious  freedom.  Progress  in 
this  direction,  then,  has  consisted  in  the  growth  of  a  really  tolerant 
spirit,  which  has  led  to  the  removal  from  Catholics,  Protestant 

1  Closely  connected  with  this  political  question  of  Home  Rule  for  Ireland,  is 
the  agrarian,  or  land  trouble.  At  bottom,  this  is  a  matter  that  involves  the 
right  of  private  property  in  land,  and  touches  questions  that  belong  to  the  In- 
dustrial Age  (see  p.  729)  rather  than  to  that  of  the  Political  Revolution. 


EFFECTS  OF  METHODISM  UPON   TOLERATION.      721 

dissenters,  and  Jews  all  civil  disabilities,  and  the  placing  of  all  sects 
on  an  absolute  equality  before  the  law.  This  is  but  a  completion 
of  the  work  of  the  Protestant  Reformation. 

Methodism  and  its  Effects  upon  Toleration.  —  One  thing  that 
helped  to  bring  prominently  forward  the  question  of  emancipating 
non-conformists  from  the  civil  disabilities  under  which  they  were 
placed,  was  the  great  religious  movement  known  as  Methodism, 
which  during  the  latter  part  of  the  eighteenth  and  the  beginning  of 
the  nineteenth  century  revolutionized  the  religious  life  of  England.1 
By  vastly  increasing  the  body  of  Protestant  dissenters,  Methodism 
gave  new  strength  to  the  agitation  for  the  repeal  of  the  laws  which 
bore  so  heavily  upon  them. 

Disabilities  removed  from  Protestant  Dissenters  (1828). — 
One  of  the  earliest  and  most  important  of  the  acts  of  Parliament 
in  this  century  in  recognition  of  the  principle  of  religious  equality, 
was  the  repeal  of  the  Corporation  and  Test  Acts,  in  so  far  as  they 
bore  upon  Protestant  dissenters.  These  were  acts  passed  in  the 
reign  of  Charles  II.,  which  required  every  officer  of  a  corporation, 
and  all  persons  holding  civil  and  military  positions,  to  take  certain 
oaths,  and  partake  of  the  communion  according  to  the  rites  of  the 
Anglican  Church.  It  is  true  that  these  laws  were  not  now  strictly 
enforced ;  nevertheless,  the  laws  were  invidious  and  vexatious,  and 
the  Protestant  dissenters  demanded  their  repeal.  The  result  of 
the  debate  in  Parliament  was  the  repeal  of  such  parts  of  the 
ancient  acts  as  it  was  necessary  to  rescind  in  order  to  relieve 
Protestant  dissenters,  —  that  is,  the  provision  requiring  persons 
holding  office  to  be  communicants  of  the  Anglican  Church. 

1  The  leaders  of  the  movement  were  George  Whitefield  (1714-1770)  and 
John  Wesley  ( 1 703-1 791).  Whitefield  became  the  leader  of  the  Calvinhtic 
Methodists,  and  Wesley  the  founder  of  the  sect  known  as  Wesleyans.  The 
Methodists  at  first  had  no  thought  of  establishing  a  church  distinct  from  the 
Anglican,  but  simply  aimed  to  form  within  the  Established  Church  a  society  of 
earnest,  devout  laymen,  somewhat  like  that  of  the  Young  Men's  Christian 
Association  in  our  present  churches.  Petty  persecution,  however,  eventually 
rained  them  to  go  out  from  the  established  organization  and  form  a 
Church  of  their  own.     This  of  course  constituted  them  dissenters. 


722        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE  CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

Disabilities  removed  from  the  Catholics  (1829). —  The  bill  of 
1828  gave  no  relief  to  Catholics.  They  were  still  excluded  from 
Parliament  and  various  civil  offices  by  the  declarations  of  belief 
and  the  oaths  required  of  office-holders,  —  declarations  and  oaths 
which  no  good  Catholic  could  conscientiously  vmake.  They  now 
demanded  that  the  same  concessions  be  made  them  that  had  been 
granted  Protestant  dissenters.  The  ablest  champion  of  Catholic 
emancipation  was  the  eloquent  Daniel  O'Connell,  an  Irish  patriot. 

A  threatened  revolt  on  the  part  of  the  Irish  Catholics  hurried 
the  progress  of  what  was  known  as  the  Catholic  E7tiancipation  Act 
through  Parliament.  This  law  opened  all  the  offices  of  the  king- 
dom, below  the  crown,  —  save  that  of  Lord  Chancellor  of  England 
and  Ireland,  the  Viceroyalty  of  Ireland,  and  a  few  others,  —  to  the 
Catholic  subjects  of  the  realm. 

Disabilities  removed  from  the  Jews. — The  Jews  were  still 
laboring  under  all  the  disabilities  which  had  now  been  removed 
from  Protestant  dissenters  and  Catholics.  In  1845  an  act  was 
passed  by  Parliament  which  so  changed  the  oath  required  for 
admission  to  corporate  offices  —  the  oath  contained  the  words 
"  on  the  faith  of  a  Christian  "  —  as  to  open  them  to  Jews. 

In  1858,  after  a  long  and  unseemly  struggle,  the  House  of 
Commons  was  opened  to  the  long-proscribed  race  ;  and  about  a 
quarter  of  a  century  later,  the  House  of  Lords  admitted  to  a  seat 
Baron  Rothschild,  the  first  peer  of  Hebrew  faith  that  had  ever  sat 
in  that  body. 

Disestablishment  of  the  Irish  Church  (1369).— Thirty  years 
after  the  Catholic  Emancipation  Act,  the  English  government  took 
another  great  step  in  the  direction  of  religious  equality,  by  the  dis- 
establishment of  the  State  Church  in  Ireland. 

The  Irish  have  always  and  steadily  refused  to  accept  the  relig- 
ion which  their  English  conquerors  have  somehow  felt  constrained 
to  force  upon  them.  The  vast  majority  of  the  people  are  to-day 
and  ever  have  been  Catholics  ;  yet  up  to  the  time  where  we  have 
now  arrived  these  Irish  Catholics  had  been  compelled  to  pay  tithes 
and  fees  for  the  maintenance  among  them  of  the  Anglican  Church 


DISESTABLISHMENT   OF  THE   CHURCH.  723 

worship.  Meanwhile  their  own  churches,  in  which  the  great  masses 
were  instructed  and  cared  for  spiritually,  had  to  be  kept  up  by 
voluntary  contributions.  The  proposition  to  do  away  with  this 
grievance  by  the  disestablishment  of  the  State  Church  in  Ireland 
ma  bitterly  opposed  by  the  Conservatives ;  but  at  length,  after  a 
memorable  debate,  the  Liberals,  under  the  lead  of  Bright  and  Glad- 
stone, the  latter  then  prime  minister,  carried  the  measure.  This 
was  in  1869,  but  the  actual  disestablishment  was  not  to  take  place 
until  the  year  187 1,  at  which  time  the  Irish  State  Church,  ceasing 
to  exist  as  a  state  institution,  became  a  free  Episcopal  Church. 
The  historian  May  pronounces  this  "the  most  important  eccle- 
siastical matter  since  the  Reformation." 

Proposed  Disestablishment  of  the  State  Church  in  England 
and  in  Scotland.  —  The  perfect  application  of  the  principle  of  re- 
ligious equality  demands,  in  the  opinion  of  many  English  Liberals, 
the  disestablishment  of  the  State  Church  in  England  and  in  Scot- 
land.1 They  feel  that  for  the  government  to  maintain  any  partic- 
ular sect,  is  to  give  the  State  a  monopoly  in  religion.  They  would 
have  the  churches  of  all  denominations  placed  on  an  absolute  equal- 
ity. Especially  in  Scotland  is  the  sentiment  in  favor  of  disestab- 
lishment very  strong. 

3.   Growth  of  the  British  Empire  in  the  East. 

The  Clew  to  England's  Foreign  Policy  in  the  Nineteenth  Cen- 
tury.—  Seeking  the  main  fact  of  modern  English  history,  Pro- 
fessor Seeley2  finds  it  in  the  expansion  of  England.  He  says,  in 
substance,  that  the  expansion  of  England  in  the  New  World  and 
in  Asia  is  the  formula  which  sums  up  for  England  the  history  of 
the  last  three  centuries.  As  the  outgrowth  of  this  extension  into 
remote  lands  of  English  population  or  influence,  England  has  come 
successively  into  sharp  rivalry  with  three  of  the  leading  powers  of 
Europe,  her  competitors  in  the  field  of  colonization  or  in  the  race 
for  empire.     The  seventeenth  century  stands  out  as  an  age  of  in- 

1  The  Established  Church  in  Scotland  is  the  Presbyterian. 

2  J.  R.  Seeley,  in  his  work  entitled  The  Expansion  of  England, 


724        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE  CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

tense  rivalry  between  England  and  Spain ;  the  eighteenth  was  a 
period  of  gigantic  competition  between  England  and  France ;  while 
the  nineteenth  has  been  an  age  of  jealous  rivalry  between  England 
and  Russia. 

England  triumphed  over  Spain  and  France^  it  remains  to  be 
seen  whether  she  will  in  like  manner  triumph  over  Russia. 

We  have  space  simply  to  indicate  how  England's  foreign  policies 
and  wars  during  the  present  century  have  grown  out  of  her  Eastern 
connections,  and  her  fear  of  the  overshadowing  influence  of  the 
Colossus  of  the  North. 

Rise  of  the  English  Power  in  India.  —  And  first,  we  must  say 
a  word  respecting  the  establishment  of  English  authority  in  India. 
By  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  East  India  Company 
(see  p.  603)  had  founded  establishments  at  Bombay,  Calcutta,  and 
Madras,  the  three  most  important  centres  of  English  population 
and  influence  in  India  at  the  present  time.  The  company's  efforts 
to  extend  its  authority  in  India  were  favored  by  the  decayed  state 
into  which  the  Great  Mogul  Empire  —  founded  in  Northern  India 
by  the  Tartar  conquerors  (see  p.  461)  — had  fallen,  and  by  the 
contentions  of  the  independent  native  princes  among  themselves. 

For  a  long  time  it  was  a  matter  of  doubt  whether  the  empire  to 
be  erected  upon  the  ruins  of  the  Great  Mogul  Empire  and  of  the 
contending  native  states  should  be  French  or  English.  About  the 
middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  former  had  the  stronger  foot- 
hold in  the  peninsula,  just  as  previous  to  the  French  and  Indian 
War  in  the  New  World  they  had  the  stronger  hold  upon  the  North 
American  continent. 

A  terrible  crime  committed  by  the  Nabob  Surajah  Dowlah  of 
Bengal,  a  province  lying  along  the  lower  courses  of  the  Ganges, 
determined  the  fate  not  only  of  that  native  state,  but  of  all  India. 
Moved  by  jealousy  of  the  growing  power  of  the  English,  and  en- 
couraged by  the  French,  the  Nabob  attacked  and  captured  the 
English  post  at  Calcutta.  His  one  hundred  and  forty-six  prisoners 
he  crowded  into  a  close  dungeon,  called  the  Black  Hole.  In  the 
course  of  a  sultry  night  the  larger  part  of  the  unfortunate  prisoners 
were  suffocated. 


THE  AFGHAN   WAR   OF  1 838-1 842.  725 

The  crime  was  avenged  by  Robert  Clive,  the  English  com- 
mander at  Madras.  With  only  100  English  soldiers  and  2000 
sepoys  (native  soldiers  in  European  employ),  he  sailed  for  Cal- 
cutta, recaptured  that  place,  and  on  the  memorable  field  of  Plassey, 
scattered  to  the  winds  the  Nabob's  army  of  60,000  (1757). 

The  victory  of  Plassey  established  upon  a  firm  basis  the  growing 
power  of  the  Company.  During  the  next  one  hundred  years  it 
extended  its  authority  throughout  almost  every  part  of  the  penin- 
sula. Many  of  the  native  princes  were,  and  still  are,  allowed  to 
retain  their  thrones,  only  they  must  now  acknowledge  the  suze- 
rainty or  paramount  authority  of  the  English  government. 

We  will  now  speak  briefly  of  the  most  important  wars  and 
troubles  in  which  England  has  been  involved  through  her  interests 
in  India. 

The  Afghan  War  of  1838-1842.  —  One  of  the  first  serious  wars 
into  which  England  was  drawn  through  her  jealousy  of  Russia  was 
what  was  known  as  the  Afghan  War.  It  was  England's  policy  to 
maintain  the  Afghan  state  as  a  barrier  between  her  East  India 
possessions  and  Russia.  Persuaded  that  the  ruler  of  the  Afghans, 
a  usurper  named  Dost  Mahommed,  was  inclined  to  a  Russian  alli- 
ance, the  English  determined  to  dethrone  him,  and  put  in  his 
place  the  legitimate  prince.  This  was  done.  The  Afghans,  how- 
ever, resented  this  interference  in  their  affairs.  They  arose  in 
revolt,  and  forced  the  English  army  to  retreat  from  the  country. 
In  the  wild  mountain  passes  leading  from  Afghanistan  into  India, 
the  fleeing  army,  16,000  in  number,  counting  camp-followers,  was 
cut  off  almost  to  a  man.  The  English  took  signal  vengeance. 
They  again  invaded  the  country,  defeated  the  Afghans,  punished 
some  of  their  leaders,  burned  the  chief  bazaar  of  Cabul,  and  then 
withdrawing  from  the  country,  left  the  Afghans  to  themselves. 

Opium  War  with  China  (1840-1842). — The  next  war  incited 
by  British  interest  in  India  was  the  so-called  Opium  War  with 
China. 

During  the  first  half  of  the  present  century  the  opium  traffic 
between  India  and  China  grew  into  gigantic  proportions,  and  be- 


726        ENGLAND  SINCE    THE  CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

came  an  important  source  of  wealth  to  the  British  merchants,  and 
of  revenue  to  the  Indian  government.  The  Chinese  government, 
however,  awake  to  the  enormous  evils  of  the  growing  use  of  the 
narcotic,  forbade  the  importation  of  the  drug;  but  the  British 
merchants,  notwithstanding  the  imperial  prohibition,  persisted  in 
the  trade,  and  succeeded  in  smuggling  large  quantities  of  the  arti- 
cle into  the  Chinese  market.  Finally,  the  government  seized  and 
destroyed  all  the  opium  stored  in  the  warehouses  of  the  British 
traders  at  Canton.  This  act  together  with  other  "  outrages,"  led 
to  a  declaration  of  war  on  the  part  of  England.  British  troops 
now  took  possession  of  Canton,  and  the  Chinese  government, 
whose  troops  were  as  helpless  as  children  before  European  soldiers, 
was  soon  forced  to  agree  to  the  treaty  of  Nanking,  by  which  the 
island  of  Hong-Kong  was  ceded  to  the  English,  several  important 
ports  were  opened  to  British  traders,  and  the  perpetuation  of  the 
nefarious  traffic  in  opium  was  secured. 

The  Crimean  War  (1854-1856).  —  Scarcely  was  the  Opium 
War  ended  before  England  was  involved  in  a  gigantic  struggle  with 
Russia,  —  the  Crimean  War,  already  spoken  of  in  connection  with 
Russian  history  (see  p.  694).  From  our  present  standpoint  we 
can  better  understand  why  England  threw  herself  into  the  conflict 
on  the  side  of  Turkey.  She  fought  to  maintain  the  integrity  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire,  in  order  that  her  own  great  rival,  Russia,  might 
be  prevented  from  seizing  Constantinople  and  the  Bosporus,  and 
from  that  point  controlling  the  affairs  of  Asia  through  the  command 
of  the  Eastern  Mediterranean. 

The  Sepoy  Mutiny  (1857-1858).  — The  echoes  of  the  Crimean 
War  had  barely  died  away  before  England  was  startled  by  the 
most  alarming  intelligence  from  the  country  for  the  secure  posses- 
sion of  which  English  soldiers  had  borne  their  part  in  the  fierce 
struggle  before  Sebastopol. 

In  1857  there  broke  out  in  the  armies  of  the  East  India  Com- 
pany what  is  known  as  the  Sepoy  Mutiny.  The  causes  of  the 
uprising  were  various.  The  crowd  of  deposed  princes  was  one  ele- 
ment of  discontent.     A  widespread  conviction  among  the  natives, 


LATER  EVENTS.  727 

awakened  by  different  acts  of  the  English,  that  their  religion  was 
in  danger,  was  another  of  the  causes  that  led  to  the  rebellion. 
There  were  also  military  grievances  of  which  the  native  soldiers 
complained. 

The  mutiny  broke  out  at  Bengal.  At  different  points,  by  pre- 
concerted signals,  the  native  regiments  arose  against  their  English 
officers  and  put  them  to  death.1  Delhi  and  Cawnpore  were  seized, 
and  the  English  residents  and  garrisons  butchered  in  cold  blood. 
Fortunately  many  of  the  native  regiments  stood  firm  in  their 
allegiance  to  the  English,  and  with  their  aid  the  revolt  was  speed- 
ily quelled. 

At  the  close  of  the  war,  the  government  of  India,  by  act  of  Par- 
liament, was  taken  out  of  the  hands  of  the  East  India  Company 
and  vested  in  the  English  crown.  Since  this  transfer,  the  Indian 
government  has  been  conducted  on  the  principle  that  "  English 
rule  in  India  should  be  for  India."2 

Later  events  :  The  English  in  Egypt.  —  It  only  remains  for  us 
to  refer  to  some  later  matters  which  are  more  or  less,  intimately 
connected  with  England's  Eastern  policy. 

In  1874  Mr.  Disraeli,  who  had  then  just  succeeded  Mr.  Gladstone 
as  prime  minister,  purchased,  for  ^£200,000,000,  the  1 76,000  shares 
which  the  Khedive  of  Egypt  held  in  the  Suez  Canal.  This  was  to 
give  England  more  perfect  control  of  this  all-important  gateway  to 
her  East  India  possessions. 

1  The  East  India  Company  at  this  time  had  an  army  of  nearly  300,000,  of 
which  number  not  more  than  45,000  were  English  troops.  The  chief  positions 
in  the  native  regiments  were  held  by  English  officers. 

-  Within  the  last  two  or  three  decades  the  country  has  undergone  in  every 
t  a  surprising  transformation.  Life  and  property  are  now  as  secure  in 
India  as  in  England.  The  railways  begun  by  the  East  India  Company  have 
been  extended  in  every  direction,  and  now  bind  together  the  most  distant 
provinces  of  the  empire.  All  the  chief  cities  are  united  by  telegraph.  Lines 
amers  are  established  on  the  Indus  and  the  Ganges.  Public  schools  have 
been  opened,  and  colleges  founded.  Several  hundred  newspapers,  about  half 
published  in  the  native  dialects,  are  sowing  Western  ideas  broadcast  among  the 
people.  The  introduction  of  European  seience  and  civilization  is  rapidly  un- 
dermining many  of  the  old  superstitions,  particularly  the  ancient  system  of  caste. 


728        ENGLAND   SINCE    THE  CONGRESS   OF   VIENNA. 

In  1878,  towards  the  close  of  the  Russo-Turkish  War,  England, 
it  will  be  recalled,  interfered  in  behalf  of  the  Turks,  and,  by  the 
presence  of  her  iron-clads  in  the  Bosporus,  prevented  the  Russians 
from  occupying  Constantinople.  In  the  treaty  negotiations  which 
followed,  England  received  from  Turkey  the  island  of  Cyprus. 

In  the  year  1882  political  and  financial  reasons  combined  led 
the  English  government,  now  conducted  by  Gladstone,  to  interfere 
in  the  affairs  of  Egypt.  A  mutinous  uprising  against  the  authority 
of  the  Khedive  having  taken  place  in  the  Egyptian  army,  an  ex- 
pedition was  sent  out  under  the  command  of  Lord  Wolseley  for 
the  purpose  of  suppressing  the  revolt,  and  by  the  restoration  of  the 
authority  of  the  Khedive  to  render  secure  the  Suez  Canal,  and  pro- 
tect the  interest  of  English  bondholders  in  Egyptian  securities. 

Three  years  later,  in  1885,  a  second  expedition  had  to  be  sent 
out  to  the  same  country.  The  Soudanese,  subjects  of  the  Khe- 
dive, encouraged  by  the  disorganized  condition  of  the  Egyptian 
government,  had  revolted,  and  were  threatening  the  Egyptian  gar- 
risons in  the  Soudan  with  destruction.  Lord  Wolseley  was  sent 
out  a  second  time,  to  lead  an  expedition  up  the  Nile  to  the  relief 
of  Khartoum,  where  General  Gordon,  a  representative  of  the 
English  government,  was  commanding  the  Egyptian  troops,  and 
trying  —  to  use  his  own  phrase  —  to  "  smash  the  Mahdi,"  the  mil- 
itary prophet  and  leader  of  the  Soudanese  Arabs. 

The  expedition  arrived  too  late,  Khartoum  having  fallen  just 
before  the  advance  relief  party  reached  the  town.  The  English 
troops  were  now  recalled,  and  the  greater  part  of  the  Soudan  aban- 
doned to  the  rebel  Arabs.  Further  complications  seem  likely  to 
grow  out  of  England's  presence  in  Egypt. 


THE   AGE   OF  MATERIAL  PROGRESS.  729 


CONCLUSION:  THE  NEW  AGE. 


The  Age  of  Material  Progress,  or  the  Industrial  Age.  —  His- 
tory has  been  well  likened  to  a  grand  dissolving  view.  While  one 
age  is  passing  away  another  is  coming  into  prominence. 

During  the  last  fifty  years  the  distinctive  features  of  society  have 
wholly  changed.  The  battles  now  being  waged  in  the  religious 
and  the  political  world  are  only  faint  echoes  of  the  great  battles  of 
the  sixteenth,  seventeenth,  and  eighteenth  centuries.  A  new 
movement  of  human  society  has  begun.  Civilization  has  entered 
upon  what  may  be  called  the  Industrial  Age,  or  the  Age  of  Ma- 
terial Progress. 

The  decade  between  1830  and  1840  was,  in  the  phrase  of 
Herzog,  "  the  cradle  of  the  new  epoch."  In  that  decade  several 
of  the  greatest  inventions  that  have  marked  human  progress  were 
first  brought  to  practical  perfection.  Prominent  among  these 
were  ocean  steam  navigation,  railroads,  and  telegraphs.1  In  the 
year  1830  Stephenson  exhibited  the  first  really  successful  locomo- 
tive. In  1836  Morse  perfected  the  telegraph.  In  1838  ocean 
steamship  navigation  was  first  practically  solved. 

The  rapidity  with  which  these  inventions  have  been  introduced 
into  almost  all  parts  of  the  world,  partakes  of  the  marvellous. 

During  the  last  fifty  years  the  continents  have  been  covered  with 
a  perfect  network  of  railroads,  constructed  at  an  enormous  cost 
of  labor  and  capital.  The  aggregate  length  of  the  world's  steam 
railways  in  1883  was  about  275,000  miles,  sufficient,  to  use  Mul- 

1  Ploctz  in  his  Epitome  of  History,  instructively  compares  these  inventions 
to  the  three  great  inventions  or  discoveries  —  the  magnetic  needle,  gunpowder, 
and  printing  —  that  ushered  in  the  Modern  Age. 


730 


CONCLUSION. 


hall's  illustration,  to  girdle  the  earth  eleven  times  at  the  equator, 
or  more  than  sufficient  to  reach  from  the  earth  to  the  moon.  The 
continental  lines  of  railways  are  made  virtually  continuous  round 
the  world  by  connecting  lines  of  ocean  steamers.  Telegraph  wires 
traverse  the  continents  in  all  directions,  and  sables  run  beneath 
all  the  oceans  of  the  globe. 

By  these  inventions  the  most  remote  parts  of  the  earth  have 
been  brought  near  together.  A  solidarity  of  commercial  interests 
has  been  created.  Thought  has  been  made  virtually  omnipresent : 
a  new  and  helpful  idea  or  discovery  becomes  immediately  the  com- 
mon possession  of  the  world.  Facilities  for  travel,  by  bringing 
men  together,  and  familiarizing  them  with  new  scenes  and  dif- 
ferent forms  of  society  and  belief,  have  made  them  more  liberal  and 
tolerant.  Mind  has  been  broadened  and  quickened.  And  by  the 
virtual  annihilation  of  time  and  space,  governmental  problems 
have  been  solved.  The  chief  difficulties  in  maintaining  a  con- 
federation of  states  widely  separated  have  been  removed,  and 
such  extended  territories  as  those  of  the  United  States  made  prac- 
tically as  compact  as  the  most  closely  consolidated  European 
state.  England,  with  her  scattered  colonies,  may  now,  Professor 
Seeley  thinks,  well  enough  become  a  World-Venice,  with  the 
oceans  for  streets.  Furthermore,  the  steps  of  human  progress 
have  been  accelerated  a  hundred-fold.  The  work  of  years,  and  of 
centuries  even,  is  crowded  into  a  day.  Thus  Japan,  on  the  out- 
skirts of  the  world,  has  been  modified  more  by  our  civilization 
within  the  last  decade  or  two,  than  Britain  was  modified  by  the 
civilization  of  Rome  during  the  four  hundred  years  that  the  island 
was  connected  with  the  empire. 

But  a  still  more  important  feature  of  the  new  epoch  is  the  use 
of  steam  engines,  electric  motors,  and  machinery  in  the  manufac- 
tures and  the  various  other  industries  of  mankind.  At  the  be- 
ginning of  the  nineteenth  century  the  great  manufactures  of  the 
world  were  in  their  infancy.  Under  the  impulse  of  modern  in- 
ventions they  have  been  carried  to  seeming  perfection  at  a  bound. 
New  motors  and  improved  machinery  have  increased  incalculably 


THE  AGE   OE  MATERIAL  PROGRESS.  731 

the  productive  forces  of  society.  This  enormous  augmentation 
of  the  power  of  production  is  one  of  the  most  significant  features  of 
the  age. 

The  history  of  this  wonderful  age,  so  different  from  any  preced- 
ing age,  cannot  yet  be  written,  for  no  one  can  tell  whether  the 
epoch  is  just  opening  or  is  already  well  advanced.  It  may  well  be 
that  we  have  already  seen  the  greatest  surprises  of  the  age,  and 
that  the  epoch  is  nearing  its  culmination,1  and  that  other  than 
material  development  —  let  us  hope  intellectual  and  moral  devel- 
opment —  will  characterize  future  epochs. 

1  "  It  is  probable,"  says  Professor  Ely,  "  that  as  we,  after  more  than  two 
thousand  years,  look  back  upon  the  time  of  Pericles  with  wonder  and  aston- 
ishment, as  an  epoch  great  in  art  and  literature,  posterity  two  thousand  years 
hence  will  regard  our  era  as  forming  an  admirable  and  unparalleled  epoch  in 
the  history  of  industrial  invention."  —  French  and  German  Socialism  in  Mod- 
em  Times. 


INDEX,    PRONOUNCING  VOCABULARY,   AND 
GLOSSARY. 

Note.  —  In  the  case  of  words  whose  correct  pronunciation  has  not  seemed 
to  be  clearly  indicated  by  their  accentuation  and  syllabication,  the  sounds  of 
the  letters  have  been  denoted  thus:  a,  like  <z_in  gray ;  a  like  a,  only  less  pro- 
longed; a,  like  a  in  have ;  a,  like  a  in  far  ;  e,  like  ee  vafeet;  e,  like  e  in  end; 
€  and  «h,  like  k;   9,  like  s;   g,  like/;   6  like  0  in/or;  §,  like  z. 


Aachen  (a'ken),  408. 

Ab-bas',  400. 

Abbassides  (ab-bas'idz),  house  of,  400. 

Abd'er-rah'man,  399. 

Abubekr   (a'boo-bek'r),  first  caliph, 

395- 
Abukir  (a-boo-keer'),  battle  of,  670. 
Absalom,  son  of  David,  65. 
Academy,  the,  at  Athens,  207. 
Ac'cad,  41,  45. 
Accadians,  civilization  of,  41. 
A-€h3e'ans,  the,  90,  91,  97. 
A-ehae'an  League,  175. 
Aehaia  (a-ka'ya),  the  name,  97. 
A-«hil'les,  95,  106,  n. 
Acre  (a'ker),  siege  of,  by  crusaders, 

445- 
A-crop'o-lis,  Athenian,  180. 
Ac'ti-um,  battle  of,  304. 
Addison,  Joseph,  629. 
A-dol'phus,  Gus-ta'vus,  k.  of  Sweden, 

583,  585- 
Ad'o-ni'jah,  65. 
Ad'ri-an-o'ple,  peace  of,  693. 
ili-ga'tian   Islands,  naval  battle  near, 

in  First  Punic  War,  253. 
ifc-ge'an  Sea,  88,  89. 
>E-gi'na,  220. 

Vthus,  96. 
/E'gos-pot'a-mi,  capture  of  Athenian 

fleet  at,  1 54. 

1-i-a'nus,  Scipio,  271,  272. 
/K-ne'as,  96. 
.K-o'li-ans,   the,    236;    migration   to 

Asia  Minor,  97. 


/E'o-lus,  103. 

/E'qui-ans,  the,  236. 

yEs'«hi-nes,  199,  200. 

^s'«hy-lus,  193,  194. 

A-e'ti-us,  Roman  general,  345. 

^E-to'li-an  League,  175. 

Africa,  circumnavigation  of,  in  reign 
of  Necho  II.,  26. 

Africa  (North),  conquest  of,  by  the 
Arabs,  397. 

Agade  (ag-a-da7),  42. 

Ag'a-mem'non,  92,  95. 

Agincourt(a'zhan-koor'),  battle  of,486. 

Ag'o-ra,  the,  98. 

Agrarian  troubles  at  Rome,  274-277. 

A-gric'o-la,  314,  3 1 5. 

Ag'rip-pi'na,  312. 

Ah'mes.     See  Amosis. 

Ah'ri-man,  83,  84. 

Ahura  Mazda.     See  Ormazd. 

Aix-la-Chapelle  (aks-la-sha'pel'), 
treaty  of,  593;   peace  of,  645. 

A'jax,  95. 

Al'a-ric,  his  first  invasion  of  Italy,  339; 
sacks  Rome,  342;   his  death,  343. 

Alba  Longa,  223. 

Albertus  Magnus,  471. 

Al'bi-tfen'sej,  493,  494. 

Al'ci-bi'a-des,  leader  at  Athens,  151, 
152,  153,  154;  as  a  pupil  of  Soc- 
rates, 206,  207. 

Ale'mae-on'i-dae,  first  banishment  from 
Athens,  120;  second  banishment, 
122;  contract  to  rebuild  the  Del- 
phian temple,  122,  123. 


734 


INDEX. 


Al'e-man'ni,  the,  336. 

Alexander  I.,  czar, 678;  II.,  696-699; 
his  assassination,  699;   III.,  699. 

Alexander  the  Great,  161-167;  divis- 
ion of  the  Empire  of,  1 70. 

Alexandria,  in  Egypt,  founding  of,  163. 

Alexandrian  Age  in  Greek  Literature, 
201,  202. 

Museum  and  Library,  1 73,  201 ; 
library  destroyed  by  the  Sara- 
cens, 397. 

Alexius  Com-ne'nus  I.,  Greek  emp., 
440. 

Alfred  the  Great,  k.  of  England,  412. 

Algiers',  533,  n. 

Ali  (a'lee),  caliph,  395,  399. 

Al'lah,  395. 

Al'li-a,  battle  of,  239,  240. 

Allodial  Lands.  —  Lands  held  in  one's 
own  right,  without  being  subject 
to  any  rent  or  service  to  a  superior. 
See  p.  424. 

Alphabet,  origin  of,  72;  spread  of,  72. 

Alsace  (al'sass'),  ceded  to  the  Ger- 

..  man  Empire,  691. 

Al'va,  d.  of,  565,  566. 

A-ma'sis,  k.  of  Egypt,  33,  no,  n. 

Am'a-zons,  186. 

Amboise   (onb'waz'),   conspiracy   of, 

574- 
America,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus, 

5*3,  5X4- 

American  colonies  (English),  separa- 
tion from  England,  632. 

Amerigo  Vespucci  (a-ma-ree'go  ves- 
poot'chee),  468,  n. 

Amiens  (am'i-enz;  Fr.  a'me'on'), 
peace  of,  674. 

Am'mon,  oasis  of,  77. 
Zeus,  163. 

A-mo'sis,  21. 

Am-phic'ty-on-y,  the  Delphian,  108, 
160. 

Amphitheatre,  Flavian.  See  Colos- 
seum. 

Amrou  (am'roo),  397. 

Am'u-noph  III.,  22. 

Am'u-rath  L,  462. 

Am'y-tis,  62. 

A-na'cre-on,  192. 

An'ax-ag'o-ras,  205. 

A-nax'i-man'der,  203. 


An'ax-im'e-nes,  203. 

An-«hi'ses,  96. 

An'cus  Mar'ti-us,  225. 

Anglo-Saxons,  enter  Britain,  344; 
their  conquest  of,  375;  their  con- 
version, 378-381. 

An-go'ra,  battle  of,  462. 

Angro-Mainyus.     See  Ahriman. 

Anne  of  Austria,  regent,  591. 

Anne,  q.  of  England,  reign,  628,  629. 

Annus  Mirabilis,  620. 

Anthony,  k.  of  Navarre,  573. 

Antioch,  171 ;  captured  by  the  cru- 
saders, 442. 

An-ti'o-chus  III.,  the  Great,  171,  172, 
268. 

An-tip'a-ter,  174. 

Antiquity  of  Man,  1. 

An'to-ni'nus  Pius,  Roman  emp.,  321. 

Antony,  Mark,  his  oration  at  Caesar's 
funeral,  299,  300;  enters  second 
triumvirate,  301 ;  usurpations  of, 
301;  revels  with  Cleopatra,  303; 
flees  from  Actium,  304;   his  death, 

3<H. 
Ant'werp,  567. 
A-pel'les,  189. 
Ap'en-nines,  222. 
Aph'ro-di'te,  102;  statue  of,  at  Cni'- 

dus,  186. 
A'pis,  29. 

A-poc'ry-pha,  the,  69. 
A-pol'lo,  102;  oracles  of,  104,  106. 
Ap'pi-us  Clau'di-us  Cse'cus,  245. 
Ap'pi-us    Clau'di-us,    the    decemvir, 

237>  238. 
Appeals,  Statute  of,  546. 
A-pu'li-a,  222. 

A'quae  Sex'ti-ae,  battle  of,  279. 
Aqueduct,  Claudian,  311. 
Aqueducts,  Roman,  352. 
A-qui'nas,  Thomas,  471. 
Arabia,  392. 
Arabs,   character   of,   392;    religious 

condition  before  Mohammed,  392; 

spread  of  their  religion  and  lan- 
guage, 401. 
Ar'a-gon,  498. 
Ar-be'la,  battle  of,  163,  164. 
Ar-ca'di-a,  87,  97. 
Ar-ca'di-us,    Eastern    Roman    emp., 

338. 


INDEX. 


735 


Arch  of  Constantine,  353. 

Titus,  314. 
Ar'ehi-me'des,  213,  263. 
Architecture,  Assyrian,  55,  56. 

Babylonian,  61,  62. 

-Chaldaean,  43,  44. 

Grecian,  176-182. 

Pelasgian,  176,  177. 

Persian,  84-86. 

Roman,  350-353. 
Architecture,  Greek  orders  of,  177. 
Archons,  the,  119. 
A're-op'a-gus,  court  of  the,  121. 
A'res,  102. 
Ar'go-lis,  87,  1 1 7. 
Argonauts,  the,  94. 
Argos,  130. 
A'ri-an-ism,  332. 
Ar-is-tar'«hus,  213. 
Ar'is-ti'des,  the   Just,  his   ostracism, 

129;   leader  at  Athens,  137,  138. 
Ar'is-toph'a-nes,  195,  196. 
Ar'is-tot'le,  208-210. 
Ar-ma'da,  Invincible,  558-560. 
Ar-min'i-us,  308. 

Army,  standing,   of  England,  begin- 
ning of,  619;   increased  by  James 
II.,  622. 
A-ric'i-a,  244. 
Ar'ri-dse'us,  Philip,  170,  n. 
Ar'ta-pher'nes,  Persian  general,  126. 
Artaxerxes    (ar'tax-erx'esj    II.,   k.   of 

Persia,  81. 
Ar'te-mis,  102. 
Ar'te-mis'i-a,  182. 
Artois  (ar'twa'),  591. 
Ar-ver'ni,  292. 

Aryans,  migrations  of,  4,  5 ;  early  cul- 
ture of,  5,  6;   importance  of  Aryan 
studies,  6;  enter  India,  8. 
As-pa'si-a,  217. 
Asshur,  emblem  of,  53. 

uir-ban'i-pal,  50,  51. 
Assyria,  political  history  of,  48-51. 
Assyrian  Literature,  57. 
Assyrians,  religion,  arts,  and  general 
culture  of,  52-57;  character  of,  53; 
thrir  palaces  and  temples,  55. 
Astrology  among  the  Chaldxans,  45. 
As-ty'a-ges,  king  of  the  Medes,  74. 
A-the'na,  102;   colossal  statue  of,  by 
Phidias,  185. 


Athenian  constitution,  reformed  by 
Solon,  120;   by  Clisthenes,  123. 

Athenian    Empire,    basis    of,    138; 
strength  and  weakness,  145,  146. 

Athenian  supremacy,  period  of,  136- 
146. 

Athenians,  mixed  origin  of,  1 1 7. 

Athens,  early  history  of,  1 17-124; 
site  of,  118;  kings  of,  118,  119; 
burned  by  Persians,  133,  134;  re- 
building of,  136;  Long  Walls  of, 
142;  pestilence  at,  148,  149;  con- 
dition at  end  of  Peloponnesian  War, 
155;  social  life  at,  219,  220;  pop- 
ulation of,  220,  n. 

A'thos,  Mount,  130;  wreck  of  Per- 
sian fleet  near,  80. 

Attica,  population  of,  117,  220,  n. 

At'ti-la,  345,  346. 

Auerstadt  (ow(er-stet'),  battle  0^678. 

Augurs,  college  of,  at  Rome,  230. 

Augs'burg,  Religious  Peace  of,  533; 
League  of,  595. 

Augustine,  his  mission  to  the  Angles 
and  Saxons,  378. 

Augustus,  Caesar,  reign  of,  305-309. 

Augustus  the   Strong,  k.  of  Poland, 

637- 

Au-gus'tu-lus.  See  Romulus  Augus- 
tus. 

Au-re'li-an,  Roman  emp.,  329. 

Au-re'li-us,    Marcus,    Roman    emp., 

32I-323- 
Aus'ter-litz,  battle  of,  677. 
Austria,  house  of,  507. 
Austrian  Succession,  War  of  the,  644, 

645- 
Austro-Sardinian  War,  711,  712. 
Aventine,  227. 
Avignon  (a'ven'yon'),  removal   of 

papal  chair  to,  457. 
A/.'of,   conquest  of,  by   Peter   the 

Great,  634. 

Babel,  tower  of,  46. 

Babylon,  taken    by    Cyrus,   60,   68; 

great  edifices  of,  61,  62. 
Babylonia,  the  name,  43. 
Babylonian  history,  58-60;    temples 

and  palaces,  61,  62. 
Bacchus.     See  Dionysus. 
Bacon,  Sir  Erancis,  562,  n.t  605. 


736 


INDEX. 


Bacon,  Roger,  471. 

Bacon,  Sir  Nicholas,  555. 

Bactria,  conquest  of,  by  Alexander, 
164,  165. 

Bagdad,  founded,  400. 

Bailly  (ba'li),  French  statesman,  652. 

Baj'a-zet,  462. 

Balaklava  (bal'a-kla'va),  695. 

Baldwin,  count  of  Flanders,  446. 

Bal'e-ar'ic  Islands,  247. 

Balliol,  John,  k.  of  Scotland,  482. 

Ban'nock-burn',  battle  of,  483. 

Barbadoes  (bar-ba'doz),  614. 

Bar'ba-ros'sa,  Algerian  pirate,  532,  n. 

Barrack  emperors,  the,  325. 

Basques  (basks),  3,  405. 

Bastile  (bas-teel'),  storming  of  the, 
652. 

Batavian  Republic,  674,  676,  n. 

Bat'tues,  665. 

Bautzen  (bowt'sen),  battle  of,  685. 

Bayard  (ba'ard),  Chevalier,  532. 

Be'his-tun'  Rock,  79. 

Belgium,  kingdom  of,  568,  n.;  revo- 
lution in,  689,  n. 

Bel'i-sa'ri-us,  372,  389. 

Bel-shaz'zar,  60. 

Beluchistan  (bel-loo'chis-tan'),  166. 

Benedictines,  order  of  the,  383. 

Ben'e-ven'tum,  battle  of,  246. 

Benevolences,  541;  resorted  to,  by 
Charles  I.,  606. 

Beresina,  the,  684. 

Berg'en,  469. 

Bergerac    (ber-zheh-rak'),  peace   of, 

575,  ". 
Berlin  decree,  679. 
BSr'lin,  treaty  of  (1878),  697,  698. 
Bes-sa-ra'bi-a,  698. 
Bes'ti-a,  Roman  consul,  277. 
Bias,  203,  n. 

Bismarck,  Otto  von,  703. 
Bi-thyn'i-a,  442. 
Black  Death,  485,  n.,  486,  n. 
Black  Prince,  485. 
Blenheim  (blen'im),  battle  of,  597. 
Bloody  Assizes,  622. 
Blucher  (bloo'ker),  687. 
Boccaccio  (bok-kat'cho),  474. 
Bce-o'ti-a,  87. 
Boeotian  League,  148. 
Bo'i-i,  Gallic  tribe,  255. 


Boleyn  (bdol'in),  Anne,  544,  546,  549. 

Bonaparte,  Jerome,  679. 

Bonaparte,  Louis,  676,  n. 

Bonaparte,  Napoleon,  defends  the 
convention,  666;  his  Italian  cam- 
paigns, 668;  in  Egypt,  669;  in 
Syria,  670;  overthrows  the  Direc- 
tory, 671;  First  Consul,  673-675; 
proclaimed  emperor,  675 ;  his  wars, 
676-685 ;  his  second  marriage,  681 ; 
at  the  summit  of  his  power,  681, 
682;  first  abdication,  685;  second 
abdication,  688_;   his  death,  688. 

Bordeaux  (bor-do'),  665. 

Borodino  (bor-o-dee'no),  battle  of,683. 

Bor-sip'pa,  temple  of  the  Seven 
Spheres  at,  61. 

Bos'ni-a,  698. 

Bos'pho-rus,  79. 

Bosworth  Field,  battle  of,  488. 

Boulak  (boo-lak')  Museum,  39. 

Boulogne  (boo-lon'),  677. 

Bourbon,  Constable  of,  531. 

Bourbon,  house  of,  in  Huguenot 
Wars,  573,  574,  575,  578;  Henry 
IV.,  k.  of  France,  578,  579.  For 
other  kings  of  this  house,  see  Louis. 

Boyne  (boin),  battle  of  the,  627. 

Braddock,  General,  631. 

Bradshaw,  John,  613. 

Brahma,  10. 

Brahmanism,    9-1 1;     modified   by 
Buddhism,  12. 

Brahmans,  8. 

Brandenburg,  587;   mark  of,  642. 

Bras'i-das,  Spartan  general,  150. 

Bren'nus,  241. 

Bretigny,  treaty  of,  486,  n. 

Britain,  invaded  by  Caesar,  292;  con- 
quest of,  by  Claudius,  31 1;  the 
Hadrian  Wall,  320. 

Bruce,  Robert,  k.  of  Scotland,  483. 

Bru'geg,  469. 

Bru-mlire',  671. 

Brun-di'si-um,  295. 

Brun-du'si-um,  447. 

Brunswick,  house  of.     See  Hanover. 

Bru'ti-um,  222. 

Brutus,  L.  Junius,  232. 

Brutus,  the  liberator,  299,  300,  302, 
303- 

Bu-ceph'a-la,  165. 


INDEX. 


737 


Buddha  (bood'ha),  II. 

Buddhism,    II,    12;    introduced  into 

China,  17. 
Bunyan,  John,  617,  618. 
Burgundians,  conversion  of,  378. 
Burleigh  (bur'li),  Lord.     See  Cecil. 
Bu'sen-ti'nus,  river,  344. 
Butler,  Samuel,  625. 
Byron,  Lord,  693,  n. 
By-zan'ti-um,  332,  333. 

Caaba  (ka'bah),  392,  393. 

Cabot  (kab'ot),  John,  542;  Sebastian, 
542. 

Cad'mus,  92. 

Caesar,  Julius,  proscribed  by  Sulla, 
283,  284;  early  life,  291;  forms 
the  First  Triumvirate,  291;  his 
Commentaries,  292;  his  campaigns 
in  Gaul  and  Britain,  292,  293 ;  civil 
war  with  Pompey,  293-296;  defeats 
Pharnaces,  296;  his  triumph,  297; 
his  genius  as  a  statesman,  297,  298; 
his  death,  298,  299. 

Cae-sa'ri-on,  304. 

Cai'ro,  32,  401. 

Caius  (ka'vus),  grandson  of  Augustus, 
308. 

Caius  Caesar.     See  Caligula. 

Ca-la'bri-a,  222. 

Calais  (kal'iss),  captured  by  the  Eng- 
lish, 485;   lost,  553. 

Caledonians,  the,  315. 

Calendar,  origin  of,  in  Egypt,  36; 
reformed  by  Caesar,  298. 

Ca-lig'u-la,  Roman  emp.,  310,  311. 

Caliphate,  the,  changes  in,  399 ;  golden 
age  of,  400;   dismembered,  400. 

Cal-lim'a-chus,  177. 

Cal'mar,  union  of,  512. 

Calonne  (kilos'),  650. 

Calvin,  John,  525,  526  and  n. 

< 'ambunian  Mountains,  87. 

(am-by'ses,  k.  of  Persia,  77. 

Ca-mil'lus,  dictator,  239,  241. 

Cam-pa'ni-a,  222. 

Campeggio  (kam-ped'jo),  545. 
;><>  1  ormio,  treaty  of,  668. 

Campus  Mar'ti-us,  227. 

("an'n.e,  battle  of,  261. 

Canossa  (ka-nos'sa),  454. 

Canute  (ka-nut'),  412. 


Cape  Breton  (brit'iin)  Island,  542. 

Capetians.  See  France.  Capetian 
kings,  491,  n. 

Cap'i-tol-ine  Hill,  226;  temple,  227. 

Ca'pre-ae,  island  of,  309,  310. 

Cap'u-a,  opens  its  gates  to  the  Car- 
thaginians, 262;  destroyed  by  the 
Romans,  263. 

Car'a-cal'la,  Roman  emp.,  326,  327. 

Ca-rac'ta-cus,  311. 

Car'bo-na'ri,  709. 

Ca'ri-a,  268. 

Carl'stadt,  524. 

Car-ma'ni-a,  166. 

Car-o-lin'gi-an  family,  beginning  of, 
404;   extinction  of,  409. 

Carthage,  247;  empire  of,  247;  gov- 
ernment of,  247;  compared  with 
Rome,  248;  destroyed  by  the  Ro- 
mans, 271;   rebuilt  by  Caesar,  297. 

Carthage,  New,  in  Spain,  257,  259. 

Carthaginian  Empire,  247;  govern- 
ment and  religion,  247.  See  Punic 
Wars. 

Ca'rus,  Roman  emp.,  329. 

Cas-san'der,  170,  171. 

Cas'si-us,  the  liberator,  299,  300,  302, 

303. 
Castes  among  Hindus,  origin  of,  89,  n. 
Castile  (kas-teel'),  union  with  Aragon, 

498. 
Catacombs,  Roman,  331. 
Cateau-Cambresis(ka'to'kon'bra'ze'), 

treaty  of,  536. 
Cathay  (kath-a'),  13. 
Cathedral-building,  505. 
Catherine  (the  Great)  of  Russia,  639- 

641. 
Catholic  Emancipation  Act,  722. 
(  'at'i-line,  conspiracy  of,  289,  290. 
(  ato,  the  Censor,  270. 
(  a-tul'lus,  354. 
(  at'u-lus,  Roman  consul,  253. 

<  amasian  Race,  2,  3. 

<  au'ea-sus,  71. 

Cavaliers,  in  English  civil  war,  610. 
Cavour  (ka'voor'),  Count,  711. 
Cawn-pore',  727. 
Ca-ys'ter,  river,  75. 
Cecil  (ses'il),  Robert,  555. 
Cecil,  Sir  William  (Lord  Burleigh), 
555- 


738 


INDEX. 


Ce-cro'pi-a,  92. 

Ce'crops,  92. 

Celts,   the,   4,   7,   369;     Christianity 

among,  379~381- 
Cel'ti-be'ri-ans,  the,  272. 
Cen'o-bites,  383. 
Censors,  the  Roman,  238. 
^en'taurs,  104. 
^er'be-rus,  104. 

-Chaer'o-ne'a,  battle  of,  160,  161. 
•€hal-cid'i-ci,  160. 

-Chaldaea,  political  history  of,  40-43. 
■Chaldaean  literature,  44-47;   religion, 

45,  46;   mythology,  46. 
-Ghaldseans,  mixed  character  of,  41 ; 

arts,  religion,  and  general  culture 

of,  43-47. 
Chalons  (sha'lon'),  battle  of,  345. 
Champollion  (sham-pol'le-on),  36. 
Chantry.  —  "  An     endowed     chapel 

where  one  or  more   priests   daily 

sing  or  say  mass  for  the  souls  of 

the   donors,    or   such  as  they  ap- 
point."—  Webster. 
Charlemagne     (shar'le-man),     reign, 

403-408;    restores  the  Empire  in 

the  West,  406;   his  death,  408. 
Charles,  archd.  of  Austria,  596,  597. 
Charles  the  Bold,  d.  of  Burgundy,  495. 
Charles    I.,    k.    of    England,    reign, 

606-612;   his  execution,  612;    II., 

reign,  6 18-62 1. 
Charles  VII.,  k.  of  France,  486,  487; 

VIII.,  495, 496;  IX.,  574,575'  576> 

577- 
Charles  V.,  emp.    H.    R.   E.,   reign, 

530-534;  his  cloister  life,  534,  535 ; 

VI.,  644,  645. 
Charles,  cardinal  of  Lorraine,  573. 
Charles  Martel,  399,  403. 
Charles  II.,  k.  of  Spain,  596. 
Charles  the  Simple,  of  France,  413. 
Chartism,  718. 
-Gha-ryb'dis,  104. 
Chastenoy,  peace  of,  575,  n. 
Chaucer  (chaw'ser),  Geoffrey,  490. 
-Ched-or-la'o-mer,  43. 
Che  Hwang-te,  13. 
•€he'ops.     See  Kufu. 
Cheviot  (chiv'e-ut),  Hills,  543,  n. 
^hi'lo,  203,  n. 
Chil'per-ic,  404. 


China,  ancient  history  of,  12-17; 
Great  Wall  of,  13;  religions  in,  16; 
ancestor  worship  in,  17. 

Chinese  Writing,  14;  literature,  14- 
16;  great  wall,  13,  n.;  morality, 
16;   competitive  examinations,  16. 

-Ghi'os,  88.       ^ 

Chivalry,  defined,  429;  origin,  429; 
training  of  the  knight,  430;  cere- 
monies of  knighting,  430;  the  tour- 
nament, 431;  decline  of,  431;  in- 
fluence of,  432. 

-Chos'ro-e§,  k.  of  Persia,  390. 

Christ,  birth  of,  308;  crucifixion  of, 
310. 

Christian  IV.,  k.  of  Denmark,  583. 

Christianity,  causes  of  rapid  spread 
of,  in  the  Roman  E.,  310;  early 
spread  of,  319,  320;  under  Con- 
stantine,  332,  Z33\  under  Julian 
the  Apostate,  334,  335;  under  Jo- 
vian, 335;  conversion  to,  of  the 
Goths,  336;  influence  of,  upon 
gladiatorial  combats,  340;  rapid 
progress  of,  343 ;  introduced  among 
the  Teutonic  tribes,  377-384;  abol- 
ished, during  French  Revolution, 
661,  662;   restored,  666. 

Christians,  persecutions  of,  under 
Nero,  312,  313;  under  Domitian, 
317;  under  Trajan,  319;  under 
Aurelius,    322;    under   Diocletian, 

33°,  331  • 

Churchill,  John.     See  Marlborough. 

Cicero,  Marcus  Tullius,  prosecutes 
Verres,  287;  oration  against  Cati- 
line, 290;   death  of,  302. 

C_id,  poem  of  the,  501. 

Ci-lic'i-a,  287,  288. 

Cim'bri,  the,  278,  279. 

Q'mon,  Athenian  statesman,  139,  140. 

Cin'cin-na'tus,  236. 

Cinderella,  romance  of,  36. 

Cin'na,  291. 

Cir-ce'i-i  (-se'yi),  281. 

Circensian  Games,  231. 

Cir'cus  Max'i-mus,  227,  350,  352. 

Cirrha,  108. 

Cis'al-pi'na,  Gal'li-a,  222. 

Cis-al'pine  Republic,  proclaimed,  668 ; 
changed  into  kingdom  of  Italy, 
676,  n. 


INDEX. 


739 


City,  the,  Greek  idea  of,  92. 

Civilization,  three  elements  of,  368. 

Claudius,  Roman  consul,  251,  252. 

Claudius,  Roman  emp.,  311,  312. 

Cle'o-bu'lus,  203,  n. 

Cle'on,  Athenian  demagogue,  149, 
150. 

Cle'o-pa'tra,  303,  304. 

Clermont  (kler'mon),  council  of,  440. 

Cleves,  Anne  of,  549. 

Cli'ents,  in  Rome,  225. 

Clis'the-nes,  reforms  of,  123. 

Cli'tus,  165. 

Clive,  Robert,  725. 

Clo-a'ca  Max'i-ma,  226. 

Clo'vis,  374;   his  conversion,  378. 

Clyt'em-nes'tra,  96. 

Cnidus  (ni'dus),  186. 

Code  Napoleon,  675. 

Co'drus,  k.  of  Athens,  118,  119. 

Coe'le-Svria,  288. 

Colbert  (kol'beV),  592. 

Colchis  (kol'kis),  71. 

Colet  (kol'et),  540. 

Coligny  (ko'len'ye'),  Gaspard  de,  ad- 
miral of  France,  573,  574,  576. 

Col'la-ti'nus,  Tar-quin'i-us,  232. 

Colonies,  Greek,  no,  1 1 1 ;  Roman 
and  Latin,  246,  n. 

Col'os-se'um,  the,  315,  316,  352. 

Columbus,  his  first  voyage,  513,  514. 

Comitia  (ko-mishl-a),  centuriata, 
227;    curtain,    224,   227;     tributa, 

235.  "• 

Com'mo-dus,  Roman  emp  ,  324,  325. 

Commons,  English  House  of,  origin, 
480,  481 ;    privileges  of,  603,  604. 
I'arliament  and  Rtfbrm  Hill. 

Commonwealth,  the  English,  613-617. 

Confucius,  15,  1 6,  17. 

Grand  III.,  emp.  II.  k.  1'..,  444. 

Con'rad-in,  last  of  Ilohenstaufen 
family,  504,  n.  » 

Con'stance,  church  council  of,  458. 
witine  the  Great,  332,  333. 

Constantine  VI.,  Eastern  emp.,  406. 
tinople,  foundingof,  332,  333; 
besieged  by  the  Saracens,  398;  cap- 
ture of,  by  the  crusaders,  446;    the 
Latin  Empire,  446. 

Con-stan'ti-us,  Roman  emp.,  331,  332, 
334. 


Consuls,  Roman,  first,  232. 

Continental  system  of  Napoleon,  679. 

Conventicle  act,  619. 

Co'ra,  244. 

Cor-cy'ra,  88,  148. 

Corcyneans,  the,  147. 

Corday  (kor'da'),  Charlotte,  660. 

Cordeliers  (kor'de-leers'),  origin  of, 
654;   clubs  closed,  666. 

Cor'do-va,  398. 

Cor-fin'i-um,  280. 

Cor'fu.     See  Corcyra. 

Corinth,  Congress  of  Greeks  at,  130, 
131 ;  in  Peloponnesian  War,  147, 
148;  sacked  by  Rome,  175;  de- 
struction of,  by  Romans,  269. 

CVri-o-la'nus,  legend  of,  235. 

Corn,  free  distribution  of,  at  Rome, 

3°4- 
Corneille  (kor'nal'),  599. 
Cor-ne'li-a,  mother  of  the   Gracchi, 

Cornelius  Scipio  Barbatus,  sarcopha- 
gus of,  365. 

Co-rce'bus,  106. 

Cor'pus  Ju'ris  Ci-vi'lis,  358;  study  of, 
in  mediaeval  age,  388. 

Cor'si-ca,  acquired  by  Rome,  254. 

Cor'tez,  Hernando,  516. 

Cos,  98. 

Cos-mog'ra-phy  of  the  Greeks,  101. 

Council,  first,  of  Church,  332;  of  the 
North,  607  and  n. 

Covenanters,  the,  origin  of,  608 ;  per- 
secuted under  Charles  II.,  619. 

(  Vanmer,  Thomas,  546,  553. 

Cras'sus,  the  triumvir,  290,  291;  war 
with  Parthia,  293;   his  death,  293. 

(  rr  Vy  (kres'se),  battle  of,  484. 

Crete,  89,  99. 

(  ri-me'a,  conquered  by  Catherine  the 
( Jreat  of  Russia,  640. 

(  rimean  War,  694-696,  726. 

■Cris'sa,  108. 

Crce'sus,  k.  of  Lydia,  75,  76. 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  his  "  Ironsides," 
611;  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland, 
613;  ejects  the  Long  Parliament, 
614;  as  Lord  Protector,  615,  616; 
his  death,  616. 

(  romuell.  Richard,  616. 

Cromwell,  Thomas,  545,  546. 


740 


INDEX. 


Cro-to'na,  III. 

Crusades,   438-451-      See    Table   °f 
Contents.     Causes  of,  438;  results, 

449-45 1- 
Cryp'ti-a,  the,  115. 
Cuba,  538,  n. 
Cuneiform  writing,  origin  of,  44;  key 

to,  79,  n. 
Cu'ri-o    Den-ta'tus,   Roman    consul, 

246,  296. 
C,y-ax'a-re§,  k.  of  the  Medes,  74. 
gyc'la-des,  the,  88. 
Cyclops,  the,  104,  176. 
(^ydnus  (sid'nus),  the,  303. 
Cj'lon,  rebellion  of,  119,  120. 
(^yn'ics,  the,  210. 
(^yn'os-ceph'a-lae,  battle  of,  267. 
(^y-re'ne,  III. 

Cjrus  the  Great,  k.  of  Persia,  74-77. 
(^yrus  the  Younger,  156. 
Qythera  (si-thee'ra),  88,  89. 
Czar  (zar),  the  name,  637,  n. 

Da'ci-a,  conquered  by  Trajan,  320. 
Danes,  in  England,  411,  412. 
Dante  (dan'te),  474. 
Dan'ton,  655;   urges  the  massacre  of 

the  royalists,  656;   member  of  the 

committee  of  public   safety,  659; 

his  fall,  663. 
Dark  Ages,  366;  history  of,  371. 
Darius  I.,  k.  of  Persia,  78-80;  reforms 

of,  in  government,  82;   III.,  82. 
Da'tis,  Persian  general,  126. 
David,  k.  of  the  Hebrews,  64. 
Dec'e-le'a,  153. 
Decelean  War,  153. 
Decemvirs,  first  board  of,  237;  second, 

237>  238. 
De'ci-us,  Roman  emp.,  328. 
Declaration  of  Indulgence,  622. 
Declaration  of  Rights,  English,  624; 

Irish,  632. 
Defoe,  Daniel,  629. 
Delhi  (del'lee),  727. 
De'li-um,  battle  of,  150. 
De'los,  88;  confederacy  of,  137,  138; 

converted    into  an  empire  by  the 

Athenians,  138,  139. 
Delphi,  87;     temple  at,  179;   oracle 

at.     See  Delphian  oracle. 


Delphian  oracle,  105,  106;  in  Persian 

War,  131,  134. 
De-me'ter,  103. 
De-moc'ri-tus,  205. 
De-mos'the-nes,   Athenian   general, 

152. 
Demosthenes,   the   Athenian   orator, 

160,  174,  199-201. 
Des-i-de'ri-us,  k.  of  the   Lombards, 

405- 

Di-a'na,  temple  of,  at  Ephesus,  178, 
179. 

Di  Cesnola,  179,  n. 

Dictator,  office  of,  at  Rome,  232,  n. 

Di'o-cle'ti-an,  Roman  emp.,  329-332. 

Di-og'e-nes,  210. 

Di'o-nys'i-us,  tyrant  of  Syracuse,  207. 

Di'o-ny'sus,  103,  193;  theatre  of,  at 
Athens,  182. 

Disestablishment  of  the  Irish  Church, 
722,  723;  proposed  disestablish- 
ment of  State  Church  in  England 
and  Scotland,  723. 

Disraeli  (diz-ra'el-ee),  727. 

Dissenters,  Protestant,  civil  disabili- 
ties removed  from,  721. 

Divination  among  the  Greeks,  104; 
among  the  Romans,  229. 

Divine  Right  of  Kings,  doctrine  of 
the,  590-601;  denied  in  the  Bill 
of  Rights,  626. 

Do-do'na,  oracle  at,  87,  105. 

Do-mi'ti-an,  Roman  emp.,  317. 

Don  Quixote  (don  ke-ho'ta),  625. 

Dorians,  the,  90,  91 ;  invasion  of  the 
Peloponnesus,  96,  97;  migrations 
to  Asia  Minor,  98. 

Draco,  laws  of,  119. 

Drag'on-nades',  the,  595. 

Drake,  Sir  Francis,  560,  570. 

Drama,  the  Greek,  193-196. 

Drogheda  (droh'he-da),  613. 

Dryden,  John&  625. 

Du-il'li-us,  C,  Roman  consul,  249. 

Dun-bar',  battle  of,  614. 

Duns  Scotus,  471. 

Dutch  Republic.     See  Netherlands. 

Dutch  War,  in  reign  of  Charles  II., 
620. 

East  India  Company,  chartered  by 
Elizabeth,  603. 


INDEX. 


741 


Eastern  Empire,  389-391. 
Ecclesiastical  Jurisdiction,  418. 
Ecclesiastical  Reservation,  the,  534. 
Eckmuhl  (ek'mUl),  battle  of,  680. 
Edda,  elder,  411,  n.;  younger,  411,  n. 
E-des'sa,  328,  n.,  444. 
Education  among  the  Greeks,  215,216. 
Edward  the  Confessor,  k.  of  England, 

412,433- 
Edward  I.,  k.  of  England,  his  con- 
quest of  Wales,  481,  482;  his  wars 
with  Scotland,  482;  III.,  claims 
the  French  throne,  484;  his  wars 
with  France,  484,  485;   VI.,  reign, 

550-552- 

Egbert,  k.  of  the  West  Saxons,  375. 

Egmont,  565. 

Egypt,  ancient  history  of,  18-26; 
geology  of,  18;  delta  of  the  Nile, 
18;  climate  of,  19;  dynasties  and 
chronology,  19,  20. 

Egyptians,  racial  affinities  of,  3;  an- 
cient classes  of,  27;  religious  doc- 
trines, 27,  28;  animal- worship,  28, 
29;  judgment  of  the  dead,  29-31; 
tombs,  31;  pyramids,  31;  palaces 
and  temples,  32,  33;  sculptures,  33, 
34;  glass  manufacture,  35;  writing 
and  literature,  35,  36;  science,  36; 
art  of  embalming,  37;  royal  mum- 
mies, 38,  39. 

E'lam-ites,  the,  42. 

El'ba,  685. 

Electors  of  the  II.  R.  E.,  507,  n. 

Elgin  (el 'gin),  Lord,  182,  n. 

Elijah,  67. 

Klisha,  67. 

E-H/s/i-an  fields,  10 1. 

Elizabeth,  q.  of  England,  554-562. 

Elizabeth  of  Russia,  646. 

Embalming,  art  of,  37-39. 

Fm-ped'o-cles,  205. 

England.  See  Anglo-Saxons  and 
Table  of  Contents.  Introduction 
of  Christianity,  382;  conquest  of, 
l>y  the  Normans,  433-437;  advan- 
tages to,  of  the  conquest,  437; 
l'lantagenet  p.,  479-489;  wars  with 
Scotland,  482,  483;  the  Hundred 
Years'  War,  484-488;  under  the 
Stuarts,  601-630;  since  the  con- 
gress of  Vienna,  715-728. 


English,  origin  of  the,  7. 

English  language,  growth  of,  489. 

En'ni-us,  354. 

E-pam'i-non'das,  157,  158. 

Eph'e-sus,  97;   temple  at,  178. 

Eph'ors,  114. 

Ep'i-cu're-ans,  211. 

Ep'i-cu'rus,  211.  • 

Ep'ic-te'tus,  357. 

E-pi'rus,  87. 

E-ras/mus,  540. 

E'rech,  45. 

E-re'tri-a,  126. 

E-rin'nyes.     See  Eumenides. 

E'sar-had'don  II.,  51. 

Escurial,  palace  of,  538. 

Esquimaux,  3. 

Essex,  Earl  of  (Elizabeth's  favorite), 

561,  n. 
Ethiopians,  the,  10 1. 
E-tru'ri-a,  222,  223. 
E-trus'cans,  the,  223. 
Eu-bce'a,  88. 
Eu'clid,  213. 
Eugene  (yoo-jeen'),  Prince  of  Savoy, 

597- 
Eu'me-ne§,  k.  of  Pergamus,  268. 
Eu-men'i-des,  103. 
Eu-phra'tes,  valley  of  the,  40;  turned 

by  Darius  I.,  60,  n. 
Eu-rip'i-des,  195. 
Eu-ro'tas,  the,  112. 
Eylau  (i'lou),  battle  of,  678. 
Excommunications,  453,  454. 

Fa'bi-us  Maximus,  the  Delayer,  260, 
261. 

Fa'bi-us,  Quintus,  257. 

Fa-bric'i-us,  246. 

Fairfax,  Sir  Thomas,  61 1. 

Fawkes  (fawks),  Guy,  602. 

Ferdinand  of  Aragon,  498-500. 

Ferdinand,  k.  of  Bohemia  and  emp. 
of  II.  R.  E,  582,  583. 

Fet'i-chiijm,  402. 

Feudalism,  defined,  421 ;  the  ideal 
system,  421 ;  Roman  and  Teutonic 
elements  in,  423;  ceremony  of  hom- 
age, 423;  relation  of  lord  and 
vassal,  —  escheat,  forfeiture,  and 
aids,  423;  development  of  the  sys- 
tem, 424;    classes   in   the   feudal 


742 


INDEX. 


state,  425;  castles  of  the  nobles, 
425;  causes  of  its  decay,  426;  de- 
fects of,  427;  good  results  .of  the 
system,  428.  See  Norman  Con- 
quest of  England. 

Finns,  the,  2,  382. 

Fire,  great,  at  Rome,  312;  in  London, 
620.' 

Fire-worshippers,  84,  n.,  401,  n. 

Fisher,  bishop,  549. 

Flam'i-ni'nus,  Roman  consul,  267. 

Flavian  Age,  314. 

Flavian  Amphitheatre.  See  Colos- 
seum. 

Fleix,  treaty  of,  575,  n. 

Flodden-  Field,  battle  of,  543,  n. 

Florence,  city,  467,  468. 

Fort  Du  Quesne  (du-kan'),  631. 

Forum,  Roman,  227. 

Fox,  Charles  James,  652. 

France.  See  Franks  and  Table  of 
Contents.  Under  the  feudal  sys- 
tem, 427;  beginning  of  kingdom, 
491;  the  Capetian  p.,  491-494;  the 
Valois  p.,  494-498;  in  the  Thirty 
Years'  War,  581,  586,  587;  ascen- 
dency of,  under  Louis  XIV.,  590- 
599;   decline  under,  599,  600. 

Francis  L,  k.  of  France,  his  wars  with 
the  emp.  Charles  V.,  531,  532;  per- 
secutes the  Vaudois,  533. 

Francis  IL,  k.  of  France,  574. 

Francis,  d.  of  Guise,  573,  574. 

Francis  IL,  emp.  H.  R.  E.,  656,  669, 
674-677. 

Franche-Comte  (fronsh  kon'ta'),  594. 

Franco-Prussian  War,  705. 

Franks,  under  the  Merovingians,  373, 
374;   conversion  of,  378. 

Frederick  Barbarossa,  in  third  crusade, 
445;  his  death,  445. 

Frederick  IV.,  k.  of  Denmark,  637. 

Frederick  II.,  of  Germany,  448,  n. 

Frederick  V.,  of  the  Palatinate,  582,  n. 

Frederick  William,  the  Great  Elector, 
642. 

Frederick  William  L,  k.  of  Prussia, 
643,  644;   III.,  653,  678;   IV.,  703. 

Frederick  III.,  first  k.  of  Prussia, 
643;   II. ,  the  Great,  644-646. 

Frederickshall,  siege  of,  638. 

French  and  Indian  War,  631. 


Fried'land,  battle  of,  678. 
Froissart  (frois'sart'),  497. 
Fronde,  Wars  of  the,  591,  n. 
Ful'vi-a,  wife  of  Antony,  302. 
Furies,  the.     See  Eumenides. 

Ga'des,  72. 

Gal'ba,  Roman  emp.,  313. 

Ga-la'ti-a,  174. 

Ga-le'ri-us,  Roman  emp.,  331,  332. 

Galileo  (gal'i-lee'o),  468,  n. 

Games,  sacred,  of  the  Greeks,   106, 

107;   influence  of,  107,  108. 
Gar-i-bal'di,  711,  713. 
Gas'cons,  405. 
Gauls,  invade  Macedonia,  174;   settle 

in  Italy,  223;  sack  Rome,  239-241 ; 

in  Northern   Italy,  conquered   by 

the  Romans,  255;    conquered   by 

Caesar,  292,  293. 
Gau'ta-ma.     See  Btiddha. 
Ga'za,  670. 
Ge-dro'si-a,  166. 
Ge'lon,  k.  of  Syracuse,  235. 
Genesis,  -Chaldsean  account  of,  46. 
Genghis  Khan(jen'gis  kawn),  461. 
Gen'o-a,  467. 

Gen'ser-ic  (Gaiseric),  k.  of  the  Van- 
,  dais,  346,  347,  372. 
German     migration,     beginning     of, 

Germanic  tribes.     See  Teutons. 

Germany,  introduction  of  Christianity, 
381;  beginnings  of  the  kingdom 
of,  501,  502;  end  of  the  kingdom 
of,  677 ;  confederation  of  the  Rhine, 
677;  end  of  the  H.  R.  E.,  677; 
confederation  of  1815,  700;  revo- 
lutions of  1830  and  1848,  700-702; 
the  Seven  Weeks'  War,  703,  704; 
North-German  Union,  704,  705; 
Franco-Prussian  War,  705;  New 
German  Empire,  705-707. 

George,  Prince  of  Denmark,  628. 

George  L,  k.  of  England,  630;  IL, 
630;   III.,  630. 

Ge'ta,  Roman  emp.,  326. 

Ghent  (gent),  Pacification  of,  567. 

Ghibellines  (gib'el-lins),  504. 

Gi-bral'tar,  ceded  to  England,  597. 

Gid'e-on,  63. 

Gil-bo'a,  Mount,  64. 


INDEX. 


743 


Gi-ron'dists,  the  name,  655 ;  party  in 
the  national  convention,  657;  fall 
of,  659. 

Gladiatorial  combats,  361-363;  sup- 
pression of,  339,  340. 

Gladiators,  war  of  the,  285,  286. 

Gladstone,  prime  minister,  719,  728. 

Godfrey  of  Bouillon  (god'fri  boo-yon'), 

442,  443- 
Godwin,  earl  of  \\  essex,  434. 
Golden  Candlestick,  347,  n. 
Go-ma'tes,  78. 
Gordon,  General,  728. 
Gor'gi-as,  205. 
Gor'gons,  104. 
Goths,  the,  336,  337;   conversion  of, 

377- 

Grac'chi,  reforms  of,  276,  277. 

Grac'chus,  Caius,  276,  277. 
Tiberius,  276. 

Grace,  edict  of,  581. 

Graeco-Persian  War,  125-135. 

Gra-na'da,  398;  conquest  of,  499,  500. 

Grand  Alliance,  the,  596. 

Gra-ni'cus,  battle  of  the,  162. 

Gra'ti-an,  Roman  emp.,  336,  337,  338. 

Grat'tan,  Henry,  632. 

Great  Britain,  the  name,  629.  See 
England. 

Great  Fire  in  Rome,  312. 

Great  Schism,  the,  468. 

Great  Seal  of  England,  624. 

Grecian  architecture,  176-182. 
sculpture,  1 87-1 89. 
temples  as  banks  of  deposit, 
178,  n. 

Greece,  divisions  of,  87;  mountains 
of,  87,  88;  islands  about,  88;  in- 
fluence of  country  upon  inhabit- 
ants, 89. 

Greek  Church,  the,  417. 

Greek  Empire.    See  Eastern  Empire. 

Greek  Fire,  398. 

Greeks,  local  patriotism  of,  92;  myths 
and  legends  of,  93-97;  society  of, 
in  the  Heroic  Age,  98-108;  piracy 
among,  99;  religion  of,  101-108; 
colonies,  no,  1 1 1 ;  literature,  190- 
202;  philosophy  and  science,  203- 
214;   social  life,  215-222. 

Gregory.     For  this  name  see  Popes. 

Grey,  Lady  Jane,  552. 


Gue'bers,  401,  n.     See  Fire-worship- 
pers. 
Guelphs  (gwelfs),  504. 
Guillotine  (gil'lo-teen'),  the,  662. 
Guiscard  (ges-kar'),  Robert,  433. 
Guise  (gweez),  family  of,  573. 
Gunpowder,  effect  of  use  in  war,  427. 
Gunpowder  Plot,  the,  602. 
Gus-ta'vus  Vasa,  512. 
Gutenberg  (goo'ten-berg'),  John,  476. 
Gy-lip'pus,  Spartan  commander,  152. 

Ha'des,  realm  of,  101 ;  the  god,  103. 

Ha'dri-an,  Roman  emp.,  320. 

Hal'i-car-nas'sus,  mausoleum  at,  182. 

Ha'lys,  the,  75. 

Ha-mil'car  Bar'cas,  252,  256. 

Hamites,  3. 

Hampden,  John,  608,  609. 

Hanging  Gardens  of  Babylon,  62. 

Han'ni-bal,   his    vow,   257;     attacks 

Saguntum,  257;   crosses  the  Alps, 

258,  259;    in    Italy,   259-264;    his 

death,  265,  n. 
Han'no,  Carthaginian  admiral,  253. 
Hanover,  house  of,  630;   sovereigns 

of,  630,  n. 
Hanseatic  League,  468,  469. 
Harold   I.  (son   of  Godwin),   k.   of 

England,  434,  435. 
Harold  Hardrada,  k.  of  Norway,  434. 
Haroun-al-Raschid  (ha-roon'al-rash'- 

id),  400. 
Has'dru-bal,  Hannibal's  brother,  264. 
Has'dru-bal,  son-in-law  of  Hamilcar, 

256. 
Hastings,  battle  of,  434,  435. 
Hcl.ert  (a'beV),  663. 
Hebrew  monarchy,  founding  of,  63, 

64;  division  of,  66. 
Hebrew  Temple,   robbed   by    Titus, 

3H. 

Hebrews,  enter  Egypt,  21;  history 
of,  63-68;  their  religion  and  liter- 
ature, 68,  69. 

Hector,  95. 

He-^i'ra,  the,  393. 

II.  Icn,  95. 

He-le'na,  St.,  688. 

I  Icl'i-eon,  Mount,  88. 

Hellas,  the  name,  91,  n. 

Hel-le'nes,  the,  89-91.     See  Greeks. 


744 


INDEX. 


Hel-len-ism,  meaning  of  the  term, 

159,  n. 
Hel'les-pont,  passage  of,  by  Xerxes, 

132. 
Hellespontine  bridges,  130,  131,  132. 
Helots,  the,  112;   revolt  of,  140. 
Helvetic  Republic,  established,  670. 
Henry  I.,  k.  of  England,  436,  n.;   II., 

437;  III.,  480,481;  VII.,  541-543; 

VIII.,  543-549- 
Henry  II.,  k.  of  France,  572;   III., 

577- 

Henry  IV.,  emp.  H.,  R.  E.,  454,  455. 

He-phaes'tus,  102. 

He'ra,  102. 

Her'a-cle'a,  battle  of,  245. 

Her'a-cles,  93,  94,  97;   -€haldsean 

origin  of  the  myth  of,  47. 
Her'a-cli'dse,  96,  97. 
Her'a-cli'tus,  203. 
Her'a-cli'us,  reign,  390,  396. 
Heralds,  college  of,  at  Rome,  231. 
Her-cu-la'ne-um,  316. 
Hercules,  Pillars  of,  71. 
HeVmann.     See  Arminius. 
Her'mes,  102;  statues  of,  at  Athens, 

152,  n. 
Hermits,  382,  383. 
Her'mus,  the,  75. 
He-rod'o-tus,  197. 
He-ros'tra-tus,  178. 
Herzegovina  (hert'seh-go-vee'na), 

698. 
He'si-od,  191,  192. 
Hes'ti-a,  102. 
He-tai'rse,  the,  217. 
Hez'e-ki'ah,  k.  of  Judah,  49. 
Hi'e-ro,    k.    of    Syracuse,    249;    his 

death,  262. 
Hieroglyphical  writing,  Egyptian,  35, 

36;  among  the  Accadians,  41. 
High  Commission  Court,  607,  n.,  622. 
Hildebrand.     See  Pope  Gregory  VII. 
Him'e-ra,  battle  of,  135,  n. 
Hinduism,  12. 

Hindu  Kush  Mountains,  165. 
Hip-par'chus,  122,  214. 
Hip'pi-as,  122,  124,  126. 
Hip'po,  72. 

Hiram,  k.  of  Tyre,  65,  72. 
History,  Divisions  of,  1. 
Hittites,  23,  24. 


Hohenlinden  (ho'en-lin'den),  battle 
of,  674. 

Hohenstaufen(ho'en-stow'fen),  house 
of,  contest  with  the  Popes,  455. 

Hohenzollern  (ho'en-tsol'ern),  house 
of,  642. 

Holland.  See  Netherlands.  In  war 
with  Louis  XIV.,  593. 

Holstein  (hol'stin),  703. 

Holy  Alliance,  692. 

Holy  League,  the,  543,  n. 

Holy  Roman  Empire,  relations  of,  to 
the  Papacy,  419;  renewal  by  Otto 
the  Great,  502,  503;  diminished 
by  the  Treaty  of  Westphalia,  587; 
end  of,  677. 

Homer,  191. 

Hong-Kong,  ceded  to  England,  726. 

Ho-no'ri-us,  Roman  emp.,  338,  342. 

Hooker,  Richard,  562,  n. 

Horace,  354. 

Horn,  565. 

Hor-ten'si-us,  355. 

Ho'rus,  28. 

Hos'pi-tall-ers,  order  of,  origin,  443; 
lose  the  island  of  Rhodes,  532; 
defend  the  island  of  Malta,  537,  n. 

Howard,  Catherine,  549. 

Hubertsburg,  peace  of,  646. 

Hu'di-bras,  625. 

Hudson  Bay  territory,  597. 

Huguenots(hu'ge-nots),  name,  572, n. 
2;  granted  toleration  by  the  Edict 
of  Nantes,  578;  political  power 
crushed  by  Richelieu,  580;  driven 
from  France  by  the  Revocation  of 
the  Edict  of  Nantes,  594,  595. 

Huguenot  Wars,  572-581. 

Humanism,  474. 

Hundred  Years'  War,  484-488. 

Hungarians,  382,  n.,  460. 

Hungary,  revolution  in  (1848),  702. 

Huns,  the,  13,  337,  345. 

Huss,  John,  506. 

Hussites,  506. 

Hyk'sos,  21. 

Hy-met'tus,  Mount,  88. 

Hy-pa'ti-a,  212. 

Iceland,  settled  by  the  Northmen,  41 1. 
I-con'o-clasts,  the,  417;   in  the  Neth- 
erlands, 564,  565. 


INDEX. 


745 


Ic-ti'nus,  180. 

II.  45- 

Il'i-ad,  the,  190,  191. 

Il'i-os,  95. 

Il-lyr'i-an  corsairs,  254,  255. 

Independents,  in  English  civil  war, 
610,  611,  612. 

India,  ancient  history  of,  8-12;  inva- 
sion of,  by  Alexander,  12;  partly 
subdued  by  Darius  I.,  79;  British 
Empire  in,  723-727;  Afghan  War 
of  1 838-1 842,  725;  Sepoy  Mutiny, 
726,  727;  government  of,  trans- 
ferred to  the  English  crown,  727; 
progress  in,  727,  n. 

Inquisition,  set  up  by  q.  Isabella  in 
Spain,  500;  character  of  the  tri- 
bunal, 527. 

Interdicts,  453,  454. 

Iona  (e-o'na),  380. 

Ionian  islands,  88. 

Ionians,  the,  90,  91;  migration  to 
Asia  Minor,  97. 

Ipsambul  (ip-sam-bool'),  temple  of, 

33- 
Ip'sus,  battle  of,  170. 
Iran  (ee-riin'),  74. 
Ireland,  introduction  of  Christianity, 

379;     during   the   Commonwealth, 

613;   under  the  Protectorate,  615; 

given  legislative  independence,  632. 
Irene  (i-re'ne),  Eastern  empress,  406. 
Ireton  (ir 'ton),  618. 
Isabella  of  Castile,  498-500. 

28. 
I§'lam.     See  Mohammedanism. 
Israel,  kingdom  of,  67. 
Is'sus,  battle  of,  162,  163. 
Italian  city-republics,  464-470. 
Italian  Renaissance,  474,   475,   510, 

511. 
Italians,  the,  of  classical  times,  223. 
I-tal'i-ca.     See  Corfinium. 
Italy,  divisions  of,  in  ancient  times, 

222;    early    inhabitants    of,    223; 

state  during  the  Middle  Ages,  509; 

as  reorganized  by  the  Congress  of 

Vienna,  708 ;  history  of,  since,  708- 

714. 
Ith'a-ca,  88. 

Ivry  (iv'ri  or  ev're'),  battle  of,  578. 
Iz-du-bar',  Epic  of,  46. 


Jac'o-bins,  origin  of  club,  654;  clubs 
closed,  666. 

Jac'o-bites,  the  name,  627. 

Jaffa,  670. 

"Jail  Delivery,"  in  French  Revolu- 
tion, 452. 

James  I.,  k.  of  England,  reign,  601- 
606;   II.,  reign,  622-624. 

James  II.,  k.  of  Scotland,  543,  n. 

Jamestown,  602. 

Ja'nus,  228;  temple  of,  closed  under 
Augustus,  307. 

Jason,  94. 

Jax-ar'tes,  the,  400. 

Jeffries  (jef'riz),  chief  justice,  622,  n. 

Jen'a  (Ger.  ya'na),  battle  of,  678. 

Jeph'thah,  63. 

Jer'o-bo'am,  first  k.  of  Israel,  66. 

Jerome  of  Prague,  506. 

Jerusalem,  captured  by  Nebuchadnez- 
zar, 58;  temple  at,  65;  taken  by 
Titus,  314;  captured  by  the  crusa- 
ders, 442;  Latin  kingdom  of,  estab- 
lished, 443;  city  taken  by  Saladin, 
444;  end  of  the  Latin  kingdom  of, 
448. 

Jesuits,  order  of,  527,  528. 

Jews,  last  dispersion  of,  321 ;  admitted 
to  English  House  of  Commons,  722; 
to  corporate  offices,  722. 

Joan  of  Arc,  486,  487. 

John,  Don,  of  Austria,  at  Lepanto, 
537;   in  the  Netherlands,  567. 

John,  k.  of  England,  quarrel  with 
Innocent  III.,  456;  signs  Magna 
Charta,  479,  480. 

Jo-se'phus,  works  of,  69. 

Jourdan  (zhoor-don'),  668. 

Judah,  kingdom  of,  67,  68. 

Judges,  the,  63. 

Ju-gur'tha,  k.  of  Numidia,  277;  war 
with,  277,  278. 

Julian  the  Apostate,  333-33$. 

Ju'li-a'nus,  Did'i-us,  325,  326. 

Juno,  228. 

Jupiter,  228. 

Justin  Martyr,  322. 

Justinian,  reign,  389. 

Ju've-nal,  319,  355. 

Kar'nak,  temple  of,  22,  33. 
Kars,  697. 


746 


INDEX. 


Khar-toum',  728. 

Khita  (khee'ta),  23. 

Khor'sa-bad,  49. 

Kleber  (kla'ber'),  670,  671;  his  as- 
sassination, 674. 

Knighthood,  religious  orders  of,  443 
and  n.  See  Hospitallers,  Temp- 
lars, and  Teutonic  Knights. 

Knox,  John,  557. 

Konigsberg  (ko'nigs-berg'),  643. 

Ko'ran,  the,  394. 

Koreishites,  393,  394. 

Kosciusko  (kos-si-us'ko),  641. 

Kossuth  (kosh 'shoot'),  702. 

Koyunjik,  55,  56;   mound  of,  55. 

Ku'dur-Na-Khun'ta,  42. 

Ku'fu  I,  20. 

Lac-e-dae'mon.     See  Sparta. 

Lac/e-dse-mo'ni-ans.     See  Spartans. 

La-co'ni-a,  87,  116. 

Lafayette  (la'fa'yeV),  653. 

La-oc'o-on  group,  188. 

Lahore  (la-hor'),  165. 

Lam'a-chus,  Athenian  general,  152,  n. 

Lamartine  (la'mar'ten'),  660. 

La'mi-an  War,  1 74. 

Lancaster,  house  of,  479,  n.;   badge 

of,  488.     See  Roses,  Wars  of  the. 
Langton,  Stephen,  456. 
La-nu'vi-um,  244. 
Lapps,  the,  3. 
La'res,  the,  228,  229. 
La  Rochelle  (la-ro'shel'),  granted  as 

a  stronghold    to    the    Huguenots, 

575;   peace  of,  575,   n.;   destroyed 

by  Richelieu,  580. 
Las  Ca'sas,  518,  n. 
Latimer,  553. 
Latin  colonies,  246,  n. 
Latin  League,  223 ;  dissolution  of,  244. 
Latins,  223;  in  the  Social  War,  279, 

280. 
La'ti-um,  222,  223. 
Laud,  William,  607,  609. 
Layard    (la'ard),    discoveries    of,    at 

Nineveh,  57. 
Lebanon,  Mount,  70. 
Leipsic  (lip'sik),  battle  of,  584. 
Leo  the  Great,  346. 
Leo  III.,  the  Isaurian,  Eastern  emp., 

398,4I7- 


Leonardo  da  Vinci  (la-o-nar'do  da 
vin'chee),  511,  n. 

Le-on'i-das,  k.  of  Sparta,  133. 

Le-pan'to,  battle  of,  537. 

Lep'i-dus,  the  triumvir,  300,  301,  302, 
3<H- 

Les'bos,  88,  97. 

Leuc'tra,  battle  of,  157. 

Leuthen  (loi'ten),  battle  of,  646. 

Lewes  (lu'ess),  battle  of,  481. 

Lewis  L,  Carolingian  k.,  408.     See 
Louis. 

Liberalism  in  England,  715-720. 

Li-cin'i-us,  C,  laws  of,  242,  243. 

Li-gu'ri-a,  222. 

Li-gu'ri-an  Republic,  668,  674,  676,  n. 

Li'ris,  the,  223. 

Literature,  Egyptian,  36;  -Chaldsean, 
44-47;  Assyrian,  57;  Hebrew,  68, 
69;  Grecian,  190-192;  Roman, 
354-359;  French,  beginnings  of, 
496-498;  under  Louis  XIV.,  599; 
Spanish,  500,  501 ;  German,  be- 
ginnings of,  508;  English,  under 
Henry  VIII.,  529;  of  the  Eliza- 
bethan Age,  561 ;  of  the  Puritan  p., 
617,  618;  of  the  Restoration,  624; 
of  Queen  Anne's  Age,  629. 

Livy,  356. 

Loire  (lwar),  665. 

Loll'ards,  the,  491,  540. 

Lombards,  the,  374,  404,  405. 

Longjumeau  (long-zhu-mo'),  peace 
of,  575,  n. 

Longus,  L.  Sempronius,  259. 

Long  Walls,  the,  of  Athens,  destruc- 
tion of,  154. 

Lords,  House  of.     See  Parliament. 

Lor'raine',  ceded  to  the  German  Em- 
pire, 691. 

Lo-thair',  emp.,  408. 

Louis,  prince  of  Conde,  573,  574. 

Louis  VII.,  k.  of  France,  444;  IX., 
448,  n.;  XL,  495;  XIIL,  579; 
XIV.,  reign,  590-599;  intrigues 
with  the  Stuarts,  620,  622,  628; 
XV.,  650;  XVL,  his  accession,  650; 
his  flight,  654;  trial  and  execution, 
658;  XVIIL,  685,  686,  687,  688. 

Louis  Napoleon.     See  Napoleon  III. 

Louis  Philippe,  k.  of  France,  689. 

Loyola  (lo-yo'la),  St.  Ignatius,  528. 


INDEX. 


747 


Lu'beck,  peace  of,  583. 

Lu'can,  313. 

Lu-ca'ni-a,  222. 

Lu'ce-re§,  224. 

Lu-cil'i-us,  354. 

Lu'ci-us,  grandson  of  Augustus,  308. 

Lu-cre'ti-us,  354. 

Luneville  (lu'ne-vil),  treaty  of,  674. 

Lu'si-ta'ni-ans,  the,  272. 

Luther,  Martin,  opposes  Tetzel,  522; 
his  ninety-five  theses,  522,  523; 
burns  the  papal  bull,  523;  at  the 
I  let  of  Worms,  523,  524;  his  death, 

525- 
Liitzen  (loot'sen),  battle  of,  585. 
Lux'or,  temple  of,  ^- 
Ly-ce'um,  the  Athenian,  122. 
Lyc'i-a,  75,  268. 
Ly-cur'gus,  legend  of,  112,  113. 
Lydia,  75. 
Lydians,  the,  75. 
Lyons,  660. 

L/-sa;i'dcr,  Spartan  general,  154. 
Ly-sim'a-chus,  kingdom  of,  171. 
Ly-sip'pus,  186,  187. 

Mac'ca-bees,  the,  68. 

Macchiavelli  (mak-ke-a-vel'lee),  468, 

n. 
Macedonia,  population  of,  159;  under 

l'hilip  II.,  159— 161 ;  after  the  death 

of  Alexander,  173-175. 
Macedonian  supremacy,  p.  of,    159— 

168. 
Mad-rid',  peace  of,  532. 
Mie-ce'nas,  minister  of  Augustus,  307. 
Mag'de-burg,  sack  of,  584. 
Magellan  (ma-jel'lan),  515,  516. 

•1  (ma-jen'ta),  battle  of,  712. 
78,  n.,  84. 
-an-ism,  78,  n. 
Magna  <  harta,  479,  480. 
Magna  ( hraecia,  1 1 1. 

Ma^'-ne'si-a,  battle  of,  268. 
Ma'g>,  brother  of  Hannibal,  261. 
Magyars   (inod'yors').     See    //un.,i 

ri.f 
Ma-har'bal,  Carthaginian  general, 

262. 
Malplaquet   (mal'pla'ka'),   battle   <»f, 

597. 
Man'de-ville,  Sir  John,  451. 


Man'e-tho,  19. 

Manlius,  M.,  240,  241,  242. 

Man'ti-ne'a,  battle  of,  158. 

Marat  (ma-ra'),  655;  his  assassina- 
tion, 660. 

Mar'a-thon,  battle  of,  126,  127. 

Mar-cel'lus,  Marcus  Claudius,  262. 

Mar-eel 'lus,  nephew  of  Augustus,  308. 

Mar'co  Po'lo,  451. 

Mar-do'ni-us,  Persian  general,  80,  135. 

Margaret,  Duchess  of  Parma,  564. 

Ma-ren'go,  battle  of,  674. 

Marie  Antoinette  (ma're'on'twa'neV), 
her  execution,  660. 

Marie  Theresa  (ma-re'a  te-ree'sa),  of 
Austria,  645. 

Mariette  (ma're-ett'),  29. 

Marlborough  (mawl'b'ro),  d.  of,  596, 

597- 

Ma'ri-us,  Caius  (ka'yus),  in  the  Ju- 
gurthine  war,  278;  defeats  the 
Cimbri  and  Teutones,  278,  279; 
contest  with  Sulla,  281 ;  wander- 
ings of,  281,  282;   his  death,  282. 

Mars,  228. 

Marseillaise  (mar'sal-yaz')  hvmn, 
658. 

Marsic  War.     See  Social  War. 

Mary  Stuart,  q.  of  Scots,  557,  558. 

Mary  Tudor,  q.  of  England,  reign, 

552-554. 

Mary,  wife  of  William  III.  of  Eng- 
land, 624-628. 

Mas'i-nis'sa,  k.  of  Numidia,  269,  270. 

Maspero,  Professor,  quoted,  39. 

Mas-sa'li-a,  in. 

Maurepas  (mor'pa'),  650. 

Maurice  (maw'riss),  of  Nassau,  569. 

Mau-so'lus,  182. 

Ma\-en'ti-us,  353. 

Max'i-min,  328. 

Max-im'i-an,  Roman  emp.,  330,  331. 

Maximilian  I.,  emp.  II.  R.  E.,  507. 

Mazarin  (maz-a-reen'),  Cardinal,  591, 
592. 

Mazzini  (mat-see'nee),  Joseph,  710. 
•  392. 

Medea,  4,  74. 

Medici  (med'e-chee),  Catherine  de, 
her  character,  573;  her  part  in  the 
naaaacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  576; 
Mary  de,  579. 


748 


INDEX. 


Medina  (me-dee'na),  396. 
Meg'a-cles,  the  archon,  119,  120,  122. 
Meg'a-lop'o-lis,  157. 
Majestas,  law  of,  309. 
Melanchthon  (me-lank'thon),  Philip, 

525»  n. 
Memnon,  statues  of,  34. 

Memphis,  20. 

Mendicant  Friars,  origin  of  the  order 
of,  456. 

Men'e-la'us,  92,  95. 

Me-ne'ni-us,  234. 

Me-neph'tha,  24. 

Me'nes,  20. 

Merovseus,  374. 

Mes-se'ni-a,  87,  116. 

Mes-se'ni-an  Wars,  116,  117. 

Mes-si'na  (mes-see'na),  117. 

Me-tau'rus,  battle  of,  264. 

Me-tel'lus,  Roman  tribune,  295. 

Me-temp'sy-cho-sis.  See  Transmi- 
gration of  souls. 

Methodism,  rise  of,  721;  effects  of, 
upon  religious  toleration,  721. 

Metternich  (met'ter-nik),  Prince, 
702. 

Metz,  653. 

Mexico,  conquest  of,  by  Cortez,  516. 

Michael  Angelo  (an'ja-lo),  468,  n., 
511,  n. 

Mil'an  decree,  679. 

Mi-le'tus,  97,  in. 

Military  roads  of  ancient  Rome,  255. 

Mil-ti'a-des,  126,  127,  128. 

Milton,  John,  617,  618. 

Minerva,  228. 

Min'ne-sing'ers,  508. 

Mi-nor'ca,  ceded  to  England,  597. 

Mi'nos,  94. 

Min'o-taur,  the,  94. 

Mith'  ri-da'  tes  the  Great,  massacres 
Italians  in  Asia  Minor,  281 ;  wars 
with  Rome,  282-288;  his  death, 
289. 

Moawiyah  (mo-a-wee'yeh),  400. 

Moe'si-a,  339. 

Mohammed  II.,  sultan  of  the  Otto- 
mans, 462,  463. 

Mohammedanism,  doctrines  of,  394; 
spread  of,  401 ;   defects  of,  401. 

Moliere  (mo'le-8r/),  599. 

Mo'loch,  248. 


Moltke,  704. 

Monasteries,  suppression  of,  by  Henry 
VIIL,  547. 

Monasticism,  rise  of,  383;  advantages 
of,  383- 

Mongols,  460,  461. 

Monk,  617.       » 

Monmouth,  d.  of,  622,  n. 

Montcalm  (mont-kam'),  631. 

Montfort,  Simon  de,  summons  the 
English  Commons  and  Parliament, 
481. 

Moors,  397;  culture  of,  401,  402; 
kingdom  of  Granada,  499;  perse- 
cuted by  Philip  II.,  536;  expulsion 
from  Spain,  538. 

More,  Sir  Thomas,  540;  the  Utopia, 
549,  550;   his  execution,  549. 

Moreau  (mo-ro'),  668. 

Mor-gar'ten  Pass,  battle  of,  506. 

Morton,  English  minister,  541. 

Mos'cow,  burning  of,  683,  684. 

Mountainists,  the  name,  655. 

Mum'mi-us,  Roman  consul,  269. 

Municipia,  279. 

Miinzer,  524. 

Murat  (mii'ra'),  Napoleon's  brother- 
in-law,  680. 

Mutiny  Bill.  —  This  was  an  impor- 
tant statute  of  the  first  year  of 
William  and  Mary,  by  which  the 
command  of  the  army  was  given  to 
the  king  for  twelve  months  only. 
The  necessity  of  an  annual  renewal 
of  this  act  secures  indirectly  the 
yearly  assembling  of  the  represen- 
tatives of  the  nation. 

Myc'a-le,  battle  of,  135. 

My'ke,  battle  of,  249,  250. 

Myt'i-le'ne,  149,  150. 

Nab'o-na'di-us,  last  king  of  Babylon, 
60. 

Nab'o-po-las'sar,  58. 

Nae'vi-us,  354. 

Nantes  (nants),  edict  of,  publication 
of,  578;  revocation  of  the  edict  of, 
594;   in  Reign  of  Terror,  665. 

Naples,  annexed  to  kingdom  of  Italy, 

712,  7I3- 
Napoleon.     See  Bonaparte. 
Napoleon  III.,  690,  691. 


INDEX. 


749 


Narses,  372. 

Nar'va,  battle  of,  637. 

Nase'by,  battle  of,  612. 

National  Assembly,  French,  651. 

Nau'cra-tis,  III. 

Nax'os,  138,  139. 

Ne-ar'chus,  admiral  of  Alexander,  166. 

Neb'u-chad-nez'zar,  58,  59. 

Ne'clio  IL,  25,  26. 

Necke;  (nek'er),  650. 

Neg-  -o-pont'.     See  Euboea. 

Ntfi  1  Race,  2. 

Nelst  n,  English  admiral,  670,  678. 

Ne'me-a,  106. 

Nem'e-sis,  103. 

Ne'o-Pla'to-nists,  the,  212. 

Nero,  Roman  emp.,  312,  313. 

Nerva,  Roman  emp.,  317,  318. 

Nes'tor,  95. 

Netherlands,  the  country,  563;  under 
Charles  V.,  563 ;  revolt  of  the,  563- 
571;  pacification  of  Ghent,  567; 
union  of  Utrecht,  567;  treaty  of 
1609,  570;  Spanish  Netherlands, 
war  concerning,  593 ;  ceded  to  Aus- 
tria, 597;  Austrian  Netherlands 
ceded  to  the  French  Republic,  669. 

Ni-cae'a,  332;  captured  by  the  crusa- 
ders, 442. 

Nice  (nees),  668. 

New  Amsterdam,  620. 

Newfoundland  (nu'fund-land'),  sur- 
rendered  by  France   to    England, 

597- 

New  Model,  the,  organized,  61 1;  dis- 
banded, 618. 

New  Or'le-ans,  631. 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  630. 

Ney  (na),  Marshal,  684. 

Nibclungen,  song  of  the,  508. 

Ni-cae'a,  165. 

Nicholas  I.,  czar,  reign,  693-696. 

Nic'i-as,  peace  of,  150. 

Nic'i-as,  152,  n. 

Nic'o-me-di'a,  330. 

Ni-cop/o-lis,  battle  of,  462. 

Niemen  (nee'men),  the,  684. 

Nihilism,  698,  699. 

Nile,  the  valley  of,  1 ;  inundation  of, 
18;  delta  of,  18;  cataracts  of,  18, 
n.;  deposits  of,  18,  n.;  Canopic 
branch  of,  25. 


Nimequen  (ne-ma'gen),  treaty  of,  594. 

Nineveh,  fall  of,  51 ;   ruins  of,  54,  n. 

Nin'e-veh,  battle  of,  390. 

Nirvana  (nir'vah-na),  12. 

No-men'tum,  244. 

Normans,  in  Gaul,  413;  in  Italy,  433, 
n. ;  their  conquest  of  England,  433- 
437;  effects  of  Norman  Conquest 
on  literature,  489, 490.  See  North- 
men. 

Norsemen.     See  Northmen. 

Northmen,  410-413. 

Notables,  assembly  of,  650. 

Nottingham,  610. 

Nov'go-rod',  469. 

Nova  Scotia  (no'va  sko'shi-a),  597. 

Nu'bi-a,  33. 

Nu'ma,  225. 

Nu-man'ti-a,  272. 

Nystadt  (nii'stad),  peace  of,  638. 

Oates  (ots),  Titus,  621. 

O'-ehus,  Artaxerxes,  k.  of  Persia,  166. 

O'Con'nell,  Daniel,  722. 

Oc-ta'vi-a,  wife  of  Antony,  304. 

Oc-ta'vi-us,  Roman  consul,  282. 

Oc-ta'vi-us,  Caius  (Augustus),  op- 
poses Antony,  301 ;  enters  Second 
Triumvirate,  301;  divides  the 
world  with  Antony,  303;  defeats 
Antony  at  battle  of  Actium,  304; 
reign  of,  305-309.     See  Augustus. 

Od'e-na'tus,  329. 

Od'o-a'cer,  348. 

O-dys'seus,  88. 

Od'ys-sey,  the,  96,  190,  191. 

O-i'leus,  95. 

O-tym'pi-a,  106,  107. 

O-tym'pi-ad,  107. 

Olympian  Council,  102,  103;  Games, 
106,  107. 

Olympian  Zeus,  by  Phidias,  185. 

Olympus,  Mount,  88. 

O'mar,  caliph,  397,  399. 

Ommaya  (om-ma'ya),  400,  n. 

( )mmiades,  house  of,  400. 

Opium  War,  725,  726. 

Oracles,  Greek,  104-106. 

Orange,  William  of,  565-569. 

Orange-Stuarts,  the,  626-629. 

Oratory,  among  the  Greeks,  198-201 ; 
among  the  Romans,  335. 


750 


INDEX. 


Ordeals,  387. 

Or'le-an§,  Maid  of,  486,  487. 

Or'le-an§,  siege  of,  486. 

Or'mazd,  83,  84. 

O-ron'tes,  the,'i7i. 

Or'phe-us,  94. 

O-si'ris,  28,  29,  30. 

Os'sa,  Mount,  88. 

Os'tra-cism,  123,  124. 

Os'tro-goths,  the,  337;    kingdom  of, 

371- 

Oswy,  k.  of  Northumbria,  380. 

Othman,  caliph,  399. 

O'tho,  Roman  emp.,  313. 

Otto  I.,  the  Great,  emp.  H.  R.  E.,  502. 

Oudenarde    (ow'den-ar'deh),    battle 

of,  597. 
Ov'id,  354. 

Oxenstiern  (oks'en-steern'),  586. 
Ox'us,  the,  165. 

Pac-to'lus,  the,  75. 

Paine,  Thomas,  654. 

Palatine,  224. 

Pa-lat'i-nate,  war  of  the,  595. 

Pallas.     See  Athena. 

Palmyra,  fall  of,  329. 

Pan-ath'e-nse'a,  the  Great,  180,  n. 

Pa-nor'mus,  battle  of,  251. 

Pan'the-on,  350. 

Papacy,  the,  basis  of  temporal  power, 
404;  growth  of  its  power,  414-420; 
primacy  of  the  bishop  of  Rome, 
415;  at  the  fall  of  the  Empire  in 
the  West,  415;  authority  enhanced 
by  its  missions,  416;  effect  upon, 
of  the  iconoclastic  controversy,  413; 
appeals  to  Rome,  418;  relations  of, 
to  the  H.  R.  E.,  419;  influence 
upon,  of  the  crusades,  449;  su- 
premacy of,  452-457;  reforms  of 
Gregory  VII.,  452;  at  its  height, 
455;  decline  of  its  temporal  power, 
457—459;  removal  of  the  papal 
chair  to  Avignon,  457;  the  great 
schism,  458;  revolt  of  the  tempo- 
ral princes,  458;  end  of  temporal 
power,  714;  decree  of  papal  in- 
fallibility, 714. 

Papal  States,  beginning  of,  404. 

Pa-pin'i-an,  326. 

Papyrus  paper,  35. 


Pa'ri-ahs,  9. 

Paris,  son  of  Priam,  95. 

Paris,  treaty  of  (1763),  631 ;  peace  of 
(1763),  646;  treaty  of  (1856),  695. 

Parliament,  English,  under  James  I., 
603,  604;  under  Charles  I.,  606, 
607;  the  Long  P.,  609;  friends  of 
the  king  shut  out,  612;  House  of 
Lords  abolished,  613;  at  the  time  of 
the  Commonwealth,  614,  615;  dis- 
solved by  Cromwell,  614;  Rump  P., 
614;  the  Little  P.,  or  Praise-God 
Barebone  P.,  614;  convention  P., 
624;  union  of  English  and  Scottish 
parliaments,  629;  Irish,  secures 
legislative  independence,  632. 

Parma,    d.    of   (Alexander   Farnese), 

567- 

Par-nas'sus,  Mount,  88. 

Pa'ros,  128. 

Parr,  Catherine,  549. 

Parrhasius  (par-ra'shi-us),  189. 

Par'sees,  the,  401,  n.  2. 

Par'the-non,  the,  treasures  of,  179, 
n.;   description  of,  180,  182. 

Par-then'o-pse'an  Republic,  estab- 
lished, 670;    abolished,  671. 

Parthia,  172,  n. 

Parthian  E.,  end  of,  334,  n. 

Pa-sar'ga-dae,  tomb  of  Cyrus  at,  77. 

Patriarchs,  the  Hebrew,  63. 

Patricians,  the  name,  224;  in  early 
Rome,  224. 

Patricius.     See  St.  Patrick. 

Pa-tro'clus,  95. 

Pau'lus,  ^E-mil'i-us,  268. 

Pau-sa'ni-us,  135,  137. 

Pavia  (pa-vee'a),  battle  of,  532. 

Peasants'  War,  524. 

Pelasgian  architecture,  176,  177. 

Pelasgians,  the,  89,  90. 

Pe'li-on,  Mount,  88. 

Pe-lop'i-dasL  157. 

Pel'o-pon-ne'sus,  the  divisions  of,  87; 
the  name,  92. 

Peloponnesian  (-zhan)  War,  the,  147- 

155- 
Pe'lops,_92. 

Pe-na'tes,  the,  228,  229. 
Pe-nel'o-pe,  96. 
Peninsular  Wars,  679,  680. 
I    Pentateuch  (pen'ta-tuk),  395. 


INDEX. 


751 


Pep'in  the  Short,  403, 404;   his  death, 

408. 
Per-dic'cas,  1 70  and  n. 
Per'ga-mus,  171,  n. 
Pe'ri-an'der,  no,  203,  n. 
Per'i-cles,  fosters  the  naval  power  of 

Athens,  141,  142;  his  social  policy, 

144;   his  death,  149;   as  an  orator, 

199. 
Pericles,  age  of,  141-146;  peace  of, 

142,  143. 
Per'i-oe'ci,  112,  114. 
Per-sep'o-lis,  ruins  of,  85;   destroyed 

by  Alexander,  164. 
Per'seus,  k.  of  Macedonia,  268. . 
Persia,  conquered   by  the  Saracens, 

396. 
Persian  E.,  established  by  Cyrus,  74; 

political  history  of,  74-82;   nature 

of  government,  82;   table  of  kings, 

86;   the  New,  334,  n. 
Persians,  origin  of,  4;   relation  to  the 

Medes,  74;   literature  and  religion, 

83,84. 
Per'si-us,  355. 

Per'ti-nax,  Roman  emp.,  325. 
Peru,  conquest  of,  by  Pizarro,  5 1 6,  5 1 7. 
Peter  the  Great,  of  Russia,  633-639 ; 

III.,  646. 
Peter  the  Hermit,  439,  441. 
Petition  of  Right,  606. 
Petrarch  (pee'trark),  474. 
Phid'i-as,  180,  184,  186. 
Phi-dip'pi-des,  126. 
Philip  of  An'jou,  596,  597. 
Philip  Augustus,  k.  of  France  in  third 

crusade,  445. 
Philip  the  Fair,  k.  of  France,  494. 
Philip  the  Handsome,  archd.  of  Aus- 
tria, 530. 
Philip  II.,  k.  of  Macedonia,  159-161; 

V.,  267. 
Philip,  Roman  emp.,  328. 
Philip    II.,  k.   of  Spain,  reign,   535— 

538;    III.,  538;    IV.,  593. 
Phi-lip'pi,  battle  of,  302,  303. 
Phi-lis'tine,  64. 
Phi'lo,  69,  212. 
I'h'i-'hus.     See  Apollo. 
Phocians,  the,  1 60. 
Pho'cis,  87. 


Ph..- 


nici-a,  70. 


Phoenicians,  racial  affinities,  70;  their 
commerce,  70,  71;  colonies,  72; 
arts  disseminated  by,  72;  enter- 
prises aided  by,  73;  circumnaviga- 
tion of  Africa,  by,  73. 

Pic'ar-dy,  439. 

Pi-ce'num,  222. 

Picts,  the,  320,  336,  344. 

Pilgrimage  of  Grace,  548. 

Pin'dar,  192. 

Pindus  Mountains,  88. 

Piracy  among  the  Greeks,  99. 

Pi-rae'us,  129,  136,  137. 

Pirates,  defeated  by  Pompey,  287, 288. 

Pisa  (pee'sa),  church  council  of,  458. 

Pis'is-trat'i-dae,  1 21-123. 

Pi-sis'tra-tus,  the  tyrant,  121,  122. 

Pis-to'ri-a,  battle  of,  290. 

Pit'ta-cus,  203,  n. 

Pitt,  William,  the  Elder,  631;  the 
Younger,  720. 

Pi/.arro  (pe-zar'ro),  Francisco,  517. 

Placentia  (pla-sen'shi-a),  council  of, 
440. 

Plague,  the,  in  era  of  Justinian,  389; 
in  London,  620. 

Plan-tag'e-net,  house  of,  479;  history 
of  P.  period,  479-489. 

Plassey,  battle  of,  725. 

Pla-tae'a,  battle  of,  135;  attack  upon, 
by  Thebans,  148;  destruction  of, 
by  the  Spartans,  150. 

Pla-tae'ans,  the,  at  Marathon,  126. 

Plato,  207,  208. 

Plau'tus,  354. 

Plebeians  (ple-be'yans),  origin,  225; 
first  secession  of,  233,  234;  ad- 
mitted to  the  consulship,  242,  243; 
admitted  to  various  public  offices, 

243- 
Plevna,  697. 
Pliny  the   Elder,  357;   the  Younger, 

his   correspondence   with    Trajan, 

3 '9,  320. 
Plo-ti'nus,  212. 
Plu'tarch,  202. 
Plu'to.     See  Hades. 
Poitiers   (poi-teerz'),  battle  of,  485, 

486. 
Pound,  tir>t  partition  of,  640;  second, 

646;   third,  640,  641 ;  revolution  in 

(1830),  693,  694. 


752 


INDEX. 


Pol-len'ti-a,  battle  at,  339. 

Po-lyb'i-us,  202. 

Pol'y-carp,  322. 

Pol'y-cle'tus,  186. 

Po-lyc'ra-tes,  no. 

Pol'yg-no'tus,  188,  189. 

Po-lyx'e-na,  189,  n. 

Pompadour  (pon-pa'door'),  Madame 
de,  650. 

Pompeii  (pom-pa'yee),  316,  317,  n. 

Pontifex  Maximus,  230. 

Pontiffs,  college  of,  at  Rome,  230. 

Pontus,  170,  n. 

Pope,  Gregory  VII.,  452-455. 

Popes.  See  Papacy.  Gregory  I., 
378;  Stephen  II.,  404;  Leo  III., 
406,  407;  Gregory  II.,  417;  Urban 
II.,  439,  440;  Gregory  VII.,  452- 
455;  Innocent  III.,  455;  Martin 
V.,  458;  Alexander  V.,  458;  Pius 
V.,  537;  Leo  X.,  544;  Clement 
VII.,  545;  Sixtus  V.,  558;  Gregory 
XIII.,  577;  Pius  VII.,  made  pris- 
oner by  Napoleon,  681;  Pius  IX., 
714. 

Popish  Plot,  621. 

Pompey,  C.  Neius,  the  Great,  in 
Spain,  285 ;  defeats  gladiators,  285, 
286;  defeats  pirates,  287,  288;  con- 
ducts the  Mithridatic  War,  288; 
conquers  Syria,  288;  his  triumph, 
289;  enters  triumvirate,  291;  rivalry 
with  Csesar,  293-296;  his  death, 
296. 

Portugal,  acquired  by  Philip  II.,  535; 
becomes  independent  of  Spain,  538, 
n.;   in  Napoleonic  wars,  679. 

Po'rus,  Indian  king,  165. 

Por'tus  Ro-ma'nus,  311. 

Poseidon  (po-si'don),  102. 

Pot'i-dae'a,  147. 

"  Potsdam  Giants,"  644. 

Prse-nes'te,  244. 

Prae-to'ri-an  guard,  formation  of,  309; 
disbanded,  326. 

Pragmatic  sanction,  645. 

Prague  (Ger.  prag),  peace  of  (1866), 
704. 

Prax-it'e-les,  186. 

Pres'ton  Pans,  battle  of,  631. 

Pretender,  the  Old,  628;  the  Young, 
631. 


Pride's  Purge,  612. 

Printing  in  China,  14. 

Pro'bus,  Roman  emp.,  329. 

Prod'i-cus,  205. 

Proscriptions,  under  the  second   tri 

umvirate,  302. 
Pro-tag'o-ras,  205. 
Protectorate,  the  English,  615,  616. 
Protestation,  the  Great,  604. 
Protestantism.     See  Reformation. 
Protestants,  origin  of  name,  525. 
Province,  first  Roman,  254. 
Prussia,  duchy  of,  642,  643;  rise  of, 

642-646. 
Psalms,  authorship  of,  64,  n. 
Psam-met'i-chus  I.,  24,  25. 
Ptol'e-mies,  kingdom  of  the,  172,  173. 
Ptol'e-my,  Claudius,  the  astronomer, 

214. 
Ptol'e-my  I.,   Soter,    172,    173;     II., 

Philadelphus,  173;   III.,  Eu-er-ge'- 

tes,  173. 
Public  lands  in  Italy,  274,  275. 
Punjab    (pun-jawb'),    conquered    by 

Darius  I.,  79. 
Pultowa  (pol-ta'va),  battle  of,  638. 
Punic   War,    first,  247-253;    second, 

258-266;   third,  269-272. 
Puritan  literature,  617. 
Puritanism,  its  extreme  severity,  625. 
Puritans^,  origin  of,  556. 
Pu-te'o-li,  284. 
Pyd'na,  battle  of,  268,  269. 
Py'los,  150. 

Pym  (Pirn),  John,  609. 
Pyramid  kings,  20. 
Pyramids,  the,  31,  32;   battle  of  the, 

669. 
Pyrenees   (pir'e-nez),  treaty   of  the, 

591. 
Pyr'rho,  212. 

Pyrr'hus,  k.  of  Epirus,  244-246. 
Py-thag'o-ras,  204. 
Pyth'i-a,  105. 

Que-bec,  heights  of,  631. 

Ra,  45- 

Races  of  mankind,  2;   table  of,  7. 

Racine  (ra-seen'),  599. 

Rad-a-gai'sus,  341. 

Railroads,  729,  730. 


INDEX. 


753 


Raleigh  (raw'li),  Sir  Walter,  560,  604. 
Ram'a-dan',  feast  of,  395. 
Ra-me'ses  II.,   23,  ^;    mummy  of, 

39- 

Ramillies  (ram'e-lez),  battle  of,  597. 

Ram'nes,  the,  223,  224. 

Raphael  (raf'a-el),  511,  n. 

Ra'phi-a,  battle  of,  49. 

Rastadt  (ras'tat),  597. 

Ravaillac  (ra'val'yak/),  579. 

Real  presence.  —  In  Roman  Catholic 
theology,  the  actual  presence  of 
the  body  and  blood  of  Christ,  in 
the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's  supper. 
See  p.  551. 

Reformation,  beginnings  of  the,  un- 
der Luther,  519-525;  progress  of, 
checked,  525-528;  general  results, 
528,  529;  in  England,  539-562;  in 
France,  572-581. 

Reform  Bill  of  1832,  716-718;  of 
1867,  718,  719;   of  1884,  719. 

Reg'i-cides,  the  English,  618. 

Reg'u-lus,  Roman  consul,  250,  251. 

Re'ho-bo'am,  k.  of  the  Hebrews,  66. 

Reign  of  Terror,  659-666. 

Renaissance  (ruh-na-songs').     See 
Italian  Renaissance. 

Restitution,  edict  of,  583. 

Restoration  of  the  Stuarts,  616-618. 

Revenue,  settlement  of  the,  in  reign 
of  William  III.,  627. 

Revival,  age  of,  characteristics  of  the, 
366. 

Revival  of  learning,  471-477;  in 
England,  539,  540. 

Revolution,  American,  632 ;  influence 
of,  upon  France,  649;  English,  601- 
608;  of  1688,  in  England,  623, 
624,  626;  French  (1 789-1 799), 
647-672;  German,  of  1830,  700; 
of  1848,  701,  702;  Hungarian,  of 
1848,  702;  Italian,  of  1820,  709; 
of  1830,  710;  of  1848,  710;  Polish, 
of  1 830- 1 832,  693,  694. 

Rhe'gi-um,  117. 

Rhe'nus,  the,  301. 

Rhodes,  88,  89,  170,  n.;  colossus  at, 
187,  188;  captured  by  the  Turks 
from  the  Knights  of  St  John,  532. 

Richard  I.,  the  Lion-hearted,  k.  of 
England,  as  a  Crusader,  445,  446. 


Richelieu  (resh'eh-loo),  Cardinal, 
579—581 ;  lays  the  basis  of  the 
power  of  Louis  XIV.,  591. 

Ridley,  553. 

Rienzi  (re-en'zee),  tribune  of  Rome, 
509.  5IO- 

Rights,  bill  of,  626. 

Rig- Veda,  the,  9. 

Robespierre  (rob'es-pe'-eV),  655; 
effects  the  ruin  of  Hebert  and  Dan- 
ton,  663;  his  part  in  the  Reign  of 
Terror,  664,  665;  his  execution, 
665,  666. 

Roderic,  k.  of  Visigoths,  398. 

Roland,  Madame,  661. 

Roland,  paladin,  405. 

Rollo,  Scandinavian  chief,  413. 

Roman  citizenship  extended  to  the 
Italian  allies,  280;  extended  to  the 
provincials,  327. 

Roman  emperors,  table  of,  349. 

Roman  Empire,  establishment  of, 
305;  extent  of,  under  Augustus, 
306,  307;  public  sale  of,  325;  di- 
vided into  prefectures  by  Constan- 
tine  the  Great,  t^V>  fina^  division 
of,  338;  in  the  East,  338,  339;  fall 
of,  in  the  West,  347. 

Roman  Law,  358,  359;  revival  of,  in 
Middle  Ages,  388. 

Romance  languages,  formation  of,  386. 

Romance  nations,  385. 

Ro-ma'noff,  house  of,  633. 

Romans,  religion  of,  228-231;  sacred 
games  of,  231;  social  life  among, 
359-365;  education,  359;  the  pub- 
lic amusements,  360;  the  drama 
among,  360. 

Rome,  location  of,  223;  hills  of,  224; 
classes  of  society  during  regal  peri- 
od, 224,  225 ;  early  government  of, 
224;  kings  of,  225;  sack  of,  by 
the  Gauls,  239-241 ;  first  Roman 
province,  254;  last  triumph  at,  339; 
ransom  of,  341,  342;  sack  of,  by 
Alaric,  342,  343 ;  effect  of  the  dis- 
aster upon  paganism,  343;  sacked 
by  the  Vandals,  346,  347;  relation 
of  fall  to  world-history,  367;  sacked 
by  the  Imperial  army,  532;  be- 
comes the  capital  of  the  kingdom 
of  Italy,  713,  ;i4. 


754 


INDEX. 


Rom'u-lus,  225. 

Romulus  Augustus,  last  Roman  emp. 

in  the  West,  348. 
Roncesvalles  (ron-thes-val'yes),  Pass 

of,  405. 
Roses,  Wars  of  the,  488,  489;   union 

of  the,  541. 
Rosetta  Stone,  36. 
Ross'back,  battle  of,  646. 
Roundheads,  origin  of  name,  610. 
Rousseau  (roo'so'),  649. 
Roussillon  (roo'sel'yon'),  591. 
Royal  touch,  superstition  of,  601,  602. 
Rox-a'na,  bride  of  Alexander,  165. 
Ru'bi-con,  the,  Caesar  crosses,   294, 

295- 

Rump  Parliament,  614. 

Runnymede,  480. 

Ru'ric,  411. 

Russia,  invasion  of,  by  Darius  I.,  79; 
introduction  of  Christianity,  382,  n. ; 
the  name,  508;  Tartar  conquest  of, 
508;  freed  from  the  yoke  of  the 
Mongols,  508,  509;  under  Peter 
the  Great,  633-639;  under  Cath- 
erine the  Great,  639-641 ;  invasion 
of,  by  Napoleon,  683,  684;  Alex- 
ander I.  and  the  Holy  Alliance, 
692;  Russo-Turkish  War  of  1828- 
1829,  693;  Crimean  War,  694,  695; 
emancipation  of  the  serfs,  696; 
Russo-Turkish  War  of  1877-1878, 
696-698;  Nihilism,  698,  699. 

Russo-Turkish  War  of  1 828-1 829, 
693;  of  1 877- 1 878,  696-698. 

Ryswick  (riz'wik),  treaty  of,  596. 

Sa'bae-an-ism,  45, 

Sacred  War,  first,  108;   second,  160. 

Sadowa,  battle  of,  704, 

Sages,  the  Seven,  203. 

Sa-gun'tum,  257. 

St.  Antony,  383. 

St.  Augustine,  358. 

St.  Bartholomew,   massacre  of,  576, 

577- 
St.  Benedict,  383. 
St.  BSr'nard,  444. 
St.  Boniface  (bo'ne'fass'),  382. 
St.  Co-lum'ba,  380. 
St.  Dom'i-nic,  456. 
St.  Francis,  456. 


St.   Germain    (zhir'man  ),   treaty  of, 

574,  575- 

St.  Jerome,  358. 

St.  John,  knights  of.  See  Hospital- 
lers. 

St.  Patrick,  379. 

St.  Petersburg,  founding  of,  637. 

Sa'is,  25. 

Sal'adin,  captures  Jerusalem,  444; 
the  antagonist  of  Richard,  445. 

Sal'a-mis,  naval  battle  of,  134. 

Sal'lust,  356. 

Sa-lo'na,  331. 

Samaria,  48,  66. 

Samaritans,  origin  of,  67. 

Samnite  War,  first,  243;  second,  244; 
third,  244. 

Sam'ni-um,  222. 

Sa'mos,  88,  no. 

Samson,  63. 

Samuel,  judge  of  Israel,  63. 

Sans-culotte  (song-ku-15t'),  663. 

Sa'por,  k.  of  Persia,  328,  n. 

Sappho  (saf'fo),  192. 

Saracens,  conquests  of,  392-402;  pre- 
serve Greek  science,  473.  See 
Arabs,  and  Mohammed. 

Sar'a-cus.     See  Esarhaddon  II. 

Sar'da-na-pa'lus.  See  Asshurbanipal. 

Sar-din'i-a,  acquired  by  Rome,  254. 

Sar'dis,  capital  of  Lydia,  75 ;  cap- 
tured by  Cyrus,  76;  sacked  by  the 
Greeks,  80. 

Sar'gon  I.,  k.  of  Assyria,  42,  48,  49. 

Sa'rum,  717. 

Sassanian  monarchy,  334,  n. 

Saul,  k.  of  the  Hebrews,  64. 

Sa-vo-na-ro'la,  Girolamo,  511. 

Saxons.  See  Anglo-Saxons.  Invade 
Britain,  336;  subjugated  by  Charle- 
magne, 406. 

Scandinavians.  See  Northmen.  Con- 
version of,  382. 

Scar-a-bae'us,  the,  29. 

Schles'wig,  703. 

Schmal'kald,  League  of,  533. 

Scholasticism,  471,  472. 

Schoolmen,  chief  of  the,  471. 

Scipio,  P.  Cornelius  (Africanus),  264, 
265. 

Scipio,  Publius  Cornelius,  259,  260. 

Scone,  stone  of,  482. 


INDEX. 


755 


Scotland,  wars  with  England,  482, 
483;  under  the  Commonwealth, 
614;   under  the  Protectorate,  615. 

Scots,  the,  320. 

Scriptures,  translated  into  the  Gothic 
language,  377. 

Scyl'la,  104. 

Seb'as-to'pol,  695. 

Sedgemoor,  battle  of,  622,  n. 

Se-ja'nus,  309,  310. 

Sel'eu-ci'a,  171. 

Se-leu'ci-dae,  the,  kingdom  of,  171, 
172. 

Se-leu'cus  Ni-ca'tor,  1 70,  171. 

Self-denying  ordinance,  in  English 
civil  war,  61 1. 

Semitic  peoples,  4. 

Sempach  (sem'pak),  battle  of,  506. 

Sen'e-ca,  312,  313,  356. 

Senlac.     See  Hastings. 

Sen-nach'e-rib,  49,  50;  palace  of,  at 
Nineveh,  56;   will  of,  57. 

Sen-ti'num,  battle  of,  244. 

Separatists,  556. 

Sepoy  Mutiny,  726,  727. 

Sep'tu-a-gint,  the,  201. 

Serfs,  425 ;  under  feudal  system,  425 ; 
emancipation  of,  in  Russia,  696. 

Ser-to'ri-us,  285. 

Ser-ve'-tus,  527. 

Servile  Wars  in  Sicily,  273,  274,  n. 

Servius  Tullius,  wall  of,  226;  consti- 
tution of,  227. 

Se-sos'tris.     See  Rameses  II. 

Set,  28. 

Se'ti  I.,  23. 

Seven  Weeks'  War,  703. 

Seven  Years'  War,  645,  646. 

Se-ve'rus,  Alexander,  Roman  emp., 
327.  328. 

Se-ve'rus,  Sep-tim'i-us,  Roman  emp., 
326. 

Seville  (sev'il),  398. 

Seymour,  Jane,  549. 

Seymour,  Ix>rd  Henry,  559. 

Sex'ti-us,  Roman  governor,  282. 

Shakespeare,  William,  562,  n. 

Sha'man-ism,  45. 

Sharrukin.     See  Sargon  /. 

Sh'l.a,  q.  of,  66. 

Shepherd  kings,  the.     See  Hyksos. 

Shiites  (shee'ites),  395,  n. 


Ship-money,  608. 

Shu'mir,  41. 

Sib'yl-line  Books,  keepers  of,  229, 
230;   burned,  283. 

Si-cil'i-an  expedition,  151-153. 

Si-^il'i-an  Vespers,  504,  n. 

Sicily,  island  of,  222;  made  a  Roman 
province,  254;  made  part  of  king- 
dom of  Italy,  712,  713. 

Sidney,  Sir  Philip,  562,  n.,  570. 

Sidon,  70. 

Silesia  (si-lee'shi-a),  645. 

Sim'o-ny,  453. 

Sinon,  96. 

Siwah  (see'wa),  oasis  of,  163. 

Skeptics,  the,  211,  212. 

Slavery,  among  the  Greeks,  98,  220, 
221;  among  the  Romans,  273,  274, 

364. 
Slavonians,  369. 

Smer'dis,  the  false.     See  Gomates. 
Smith,  Sir  Sidney,  670. 
Smyrna  (smir'na),  191. 
Sobieski  (so-be-es'kee),  538,  n.  1. 
Social  life  among  the  Romans,  359- 

365. 
Social  War  in  Italy,  279,  281. 
So'ci-i,  279. 

Soc'ra-tes,  121,  156,  206,  207. 
SogMi-a'na,  165. 

Soissons  (swas'son'),  vase  of,  373,  n. 
Solferino  (sol-fa-ree'no) , battle  of,  712. 
Solomon,  k.  of  the  Hebrews,  65,  66. 
Solon,  laws  and  reforms  of,  120-122. 
Solyman  (sol'i-man)  the  Magnificent, 

531. 

Sophia,  electress  of  Hanover,  629. 

Soph'ists,  the,  205,  206. 

Soph'o-cles,  193,  194. 

Soudanese,  revolt  against  the  khedive, 
728 

Spac-te'ri-a,  150. 

Spain,  conquest  of,  by  Saracens,  398; 
union  of  Castile  and  Aragon,  498; 
conquest  of  Granada,  499;  the  In- 
quisition in,  500;  Spanish  coloni- 
zation in  the  New  World,  517;  as- 
cendency of,  under  Charles  V.  and 
Philip  II.,  530-538;  her  rapid  de- 
cline, 538;  revolt  of  her  American 
colonies,  538,  n.;  in  the  war  of  the 
Spanish  Succession,  596. 


756 


INDEX. 


Spanish  Fury,  the,  567. 
Spanish  Succession,  war  of  the,  596, 
597,628. 

Sparta,  early  history  of,  112-1  iy;  op- 
poses the  Athenian  democracy, 
124. 

Spar'ta-cus,  285,  286. 

Spartan  supremacy,  155,  156. 

Spartans,  the.     See  Sparta. 

Spar'ti-a'tae.     See  Spartans. 

Spenser,  Edmund,  562,  n. 

Sphinx,  great  Egyptian,  34. 

Spires,  second  diet  of,  525. 

Spor'a-des,  the,  88. 

Spu-rin'na,  Roman  astrologer,  299. 

Sta-gi'ra,  209. 

Stamford  Bridge,  battle  of,  434. 

Stanislaus  Lesczinski  (lesh-chin'shee), 
638. 

Star  Chamber,  the,  607,  n. 

States-General  of  France,  first  meet- 
ing of,  494;  no  meeting  under 
Louis  XIV.,  592;  meeting  of,  in 
1 789,  650,  65 1 ;  changed  into  the 
National  Assembly,  651. 

Steamship,  ocean,  navigation,  729. 

Stephen  of  Blois  (blwa),  436,  n. 

Stil'i-cho,  339,  341. 

Stoics,  the,  210,  211. 

Strel'it-zes,  635. 

Stuart,  house  of.  See  Table  of  Con- 
tents. 

Stuart,  Henry  (Lord  Darnley),  557. 

Stuart,  Mary,  557,  558. 

Su'dras,  8,  II. 

Sue'vi,  341 ;   conversion  of,  378. 

Suez  Canal,  727,  728. 

Suf'fe-te§,  Carthaginian  magistrates, 
247. 

Sulla,  fights  under  Marius  in  Africa, 
278;  secures  command  of  Mithri- 
datic  expedition,  281;  brings  war 
to  a  close,  282,  283;  proscriptions 
of,  283,  284. 

Su'ni-um,  179,  n. 

Sun'nites,  395,  n. 

Supremacy,  act  of,  546,  555. 

Supreme  Being,  worship  of,  set  up 
by  Robespierre,  664. 

Surajah  Dowlah  (sur-a'jah  dow'lah"), 
724. 

Surat  (soo-raf),  603. 


Su'sa,  42,  78. 

Sut-tee',  12,  n. 

Sweden,  in  Thirty  Years'  War,  583- 
586;  receives  lands  in  Germany, 
587;  under  Charles  XII.,  636,  637, 
638. 

Swift,  Jonathan^  629. 

Swiss  Guards,  massacre  of  the,  656. 

Sy-a'gri-us,  374. 

Syb'a-ris,  III. 

Syracuse,  in,  152,  262. 

Tabor,  Mount,  battle  of,  670,  n. 

Tac'i-tus,  the  historian,  356. 

Tac'i-tus,  Roman  emp.,  329. 

Ta'gus,  the,  400. 

Tal'mud,  69. 

Tam'er-lane,  461. 

Tancred,  442,  443. 

Tao,  17. 

Taoism  (ta'o-ism),  17. 

Ta-ren'tum,  in,  244,  245. 

Tar-pe'i-a  (-ya),  242,  n. 

Tar-pe'i-an  Rock,  242,  n. 

Tar-quin'i-us  Priscus,  225 ;  Superbus, 
225,  227. 

Tarquins,  the,  Rome  under,  226;  ex- 
pulsion from  Rome,  227. 

Tar'ta-rus,  101. 

Te'ge-a,  117. 

Tel'a-mon,  battle  near,  255. 

Telegraph,  729,  730. 

Te-lem'a-ehus,  340. 

Tell,  William,  506. 

Tem'pe,  vale  of,  87. 

Templars,  order  of  the,  origin,  443,  n. 

Ten  Thousand  Greeks,  the,  expedi- 
tion of,  156. 

Ten  Tribes,  the,  captivity  of,  48. 

Ter'ence,  354. 

Test  Act,  621. 

Tetzel,  521,  522. 

Teu'to-nes,  the,  278,  279. 

Teutonic  knights,  order  of,  origin, 
443. 

Teutons,  the,  their  character,  368, 
369;  kingdoms  established  by,  371- 
376;  conversion  of,  377-384;  fu- 
sion with  the  Latins,  385-388; 
legislation  of,  386;  ordeals  among, 
387,  388. 

Tha'les,  203,  n. 


INDEX. 


757 


Thap'sus,  battle  of,  297. 

Theatre,  the,  among  the  Greeks,  217, 

218. 
Theatre  of  Dionysus,  at  Athens,  182. 
Theban  supremacy,  156-158. 
Thebes,  in  Egypt,  20;    royal  tombs 

at,  31. 
Thebes,  in  Greece,  87;   destroyed  by 

Alexander,  161,  162. 
The-mis'to-cles,     in     Persian     War, 

1 28- 1 30;     naval    policy    of,    136; 

his  ostracism,  137;   as   an   orator, 

199. 
The-oc'ri-tus,  202. 
The-od'o-ric,    k.   of    the    Visigoths, 

371- 
The'o-do'si-us  the  Great,  337,  338. 
Ther'mae,  Roman,  352,  353. 
Ther-mop'y-be,  battle  of,  132,  133. 
The'seus,  94,  118. 
Thespians,  at  Thermopylae,  133. 
Thespis,  193. 
Thes;sa-ly,  87. 
Thiers  (te-eV),  691. 
Thirty-nine  articles,  551. 
Thirty  tyrants,  328. 
Thirty  Years'  War,  582-589. 
Thor,  379. 
Thoth'mes  II.,  22. 
Thrace,   made   part   of    the    Persian 

Empire,  80;   kingdom  of,  171. 
Thucydides  (thu-sid'i-dez),  197,  198. 
Tibenne  Republic,  established,  670; 

abolished,  671. 
Ti-be'ri-us,  Roman  emp.,  309,  310. 
Ti'l.ur,  244,  329. 
Ti-ci'-nus,  battle  of  the,  260. 
Tiers  Etat  (te-Srz'  a'ta'),  651. 
Titf'lath-i-nin',  43,  58. 
TigMath-l'i-le'ser  I.,  48;    II.,  48. 
Tigris,  valley  of  the,  40. 

til'le),  583,  584. 
1  ilMt,  treaty  of,  678. 
Ti'mon,  the    Athenian   misanthrope, 

151. 
Titian  (tish'an),  511,  n. 

.  224." 
Titus,  Roman  emp.,  3 15-3 1 7. 
Tobacco,   introduced    into    England, 

561. 
Todleben  (tot'la-bcn),  695. 
To-le'do,  398. 


Tory.  —  This  term  probably  comes 
from  the  Irish  word  toree  (give 
me),  the  command  of  the  robber. 
Before  pressed  into  political  ser- 
vice, it  was  applied  to  the  half- 
civilized  natives  of  certain  districts 
in  Ireland. 

Tory,  origin  of  T.  party,  621. 

Tostig,  434. 

Toulon  (too-lon'),  665. 

Tournament,  431. 

Tours  (toor),  battle  of,  398. 

Tower  of  London,  605. 

Towns,  growth  of,  464;  relations  of, 
to  the  feudal  lords,  464. 

Traf'al-gar',  battle  of,  678. 

Trajan,  Roman  emp.,  318-321. 

Transmigration  of  souls,  among  the 
Brahmans,  10,  1 1 ;  among  the 
Egyptians,  30,  31. 

Tras-i-me'nus,  Lake,  battle  of,  260. 

Tre'bi-a,  battle  of  the,  260. 

Tri-bo'ni-an,  358. 

Tribunes,  Roman,  234,  235;  military 
tribunes,  238. 

Triple  Alliance,  the,  593. 

Tri-um'vi-rate,  First,  291 ;  Second, 
300-302,  303. 

Trojan  War,  the,  94-96. 

Troubadours(troo'ba-doors'),496,497. 

Trouveurs,  497. 

Troy.     See  Ilios. 

Troyes  (trwa),  treaty  of,  486. 

Truceless  War,  the,  256. 

True  Cross,  the,  390,  396. 

Tudor,  house  of,  England  under,  539- 
562;  names  of  Tudor  sovereigns, 
539.  "• 

1  uileries,  palace  of  the,  653. 

Tul'lus  Hos-til'i-us,  225. 

Tunis,  532,  n. 

Turanian  peoples,  2,  3. 

Turcot  (tiir'go'),  650. 

Tu'rin,  713. 

Turks,  embrace  Mohammedanism, 
396;  the  Seljuks,  460;  Ottoman 
T.,  empire  of,  founded,  461-463; 
they  capture  Constantinople,  462; 
check  to  their  arms,  463;  defeated 
at  Lepanto,  537;  besiege  Vienna, 
538,  n.  1.  See  Russo-  Turkish 
Wars. 


758 


INDEX. 


Twelve  tables  of  Roman  law,  236,  237. 

Tyburn,  618. 

Ty'phon.     See  Set. 

Tyrants,  Greek,  109,  no. 

Tyre,  captured   by  Nebuchadnezzar, 

59;  history  of,  70,  71;  siege  of,  by 

Alexander,  163. 
Tyr-tae'us,  1 16,  117. 
Tzar.     See  Czar. 

Ul'fi-las,  377- 

Ulm  (Ger.  661m),  battle  of,  677. 

U-lys'ses.     See  Odysseus. 

Um'bri-a,  222. 

Uniformity,  acts  to  secure,  551;  act 

of,  555,  556. 
Union,  Customs,  701. 
Universities,  in  the  Middle  Ages,  472. 
Ur,  of  the  -Chaldees,  63. 
U'ti-ca,  72. 
Utrecht    (u'trekt),    union    of,    567; 

treaty  of,  597. 

Va'lens,  Roman  emp.,  335,  336. 

Val'en-tin'i-an,  Roman  emp.,  335,336. 

Valerian,  Roman  emp.,  328,  n. 

Va-le'ri-us,  Pub'li-us,  232. 

Valmy,  battle  of,  657. 

Valois  (val'wa'),  house  of,  494,  n.; 
history  of  France  under  Valois  sov- 
ereigns, 494-496. 

Valois  .Orleans,  house  of,  572,  n. 

Vandals,  establish  kingdom  in  North 
Africa,  344;  sack  Rome,  346;  con- 
version of,  378. 

Va'rus,  defeated  by  Hermann,  308. 

Vasco  da  Gama  (vas'ko  da  ga'ma), 

,   5H,5I5. 

Vassey,  massacre  of,  574. 

Vat'i-can,  council  of  the,  714. 

Vaudois  (vo-dwa/),  533. 

Ve'das,  9. 

Veii  (ve'yi),  siege  of,  238,  239. 

Vendee  (von'da'),  658. 

Vendidad,  the,  83. 

Ven'e-ti,  the,  346. 

Ve-ne'ti-a,  222. 

Venice,  takes  part  in  the  fourth  cru- 
sade, 446;  general  sketch  of  its 
history,  466,  467 ;  becomes  part  of 
the  kingdom  of  Italy,  713. 

Ver-cel'lae,  battle  of,  279. 


Ver'cin-get'o-rix,  292. 

Ver'dun',  treaty  of,  408. 

Ve-ro'na,  battle  at,  339. 

Ver'res,  abuses  of,  286,  287. 

Versailles  (ver-salz'),  648. 

Vespasian  (ves-pa'zhi-an),  Roman 
emp.,  314,  315. 

Ves'ta,  the  worship  of,  228. 

Victor  Emmanuel  I.,  k.  of  Sardinia, 
709;  II.,  71 1;  takes  possession  of 
Rome,  714;   his  death,  714,  n. 

Victor  Hugo,  667. 

Vienna,  congress  of,  685,  686;  reor- 
ganization of  Germany  by,  700;  of 
Italy,  708. 

Vil'leins,  425. 

Vin'do-bo'na,  323. 

Vineland,  411. 

Virgil,  354. 

Virginia,  origin  of  name,  560. 

Visigoths,  the,  336,  337;  establish 
kingdom  in  Gaul  and  Spain,  344, 
372- . 

Vi-tel'li-us,  Roman  emp.,  313. 

Vol'ga,  638. 

Volscians,  the,  235. 

Voltaire  (vol-ter'),  649. 

Vul'gate,  358,  n. 

Wafels,  battle  of,  506. 
Wa'gram,  battle  of,  680. 
Waiblings._    See  Ghibellines. 
Wal-den'ses.     See  Vaudois. 
Waldo,  Peter,  533,  n. 
Wales,  conquest  of,  481. 
Wallenstein    (wol'en-stin),    first    ap- 
pearance in  Thirty  Years'  War,  583 ; 

removed  from  his  command,  583; 

restored,    585;    his    assassination, 

586. 
Walsingham,  Sir  Francis,  555. 
Walter  the  Penniless,  441. 
Warsaw,  grand  duchy  of,  679. 
Waterloo,  687,  688. 
Welfs.     See  Guelphs. 
Wellesley  (welz'le),  Sir  Arthur  (d.  of 

Wellington),  in  Spain,  680. 
Wentworth,  Thomas,  607,  609. 
Wesley,  John,  721,  n. 
Western   Empire    (Teutonic).      See 

Charlemagne  and  the  Holy  Roman 

Empire. 


INDEX. 


759 


West-pha'li-a,  treaty  of,  586-589; 
kingdom  of,  679. 

Whig. — The  origin  of  this  word  is  a 
little  uncertain;  some  get  it  from 
the  initial  letters  of  the  phrase, 
"  We  hope  in  God,"  which  was  the 
motto  of  some  of  the  early  mem- 
bers of  the  party ;  others  from  whey, 
the  drink  of  the  Scotch  covenanters. 

Whi^s,  origin  of  W.  party,  621. 

Whitby,  council  of,  380. 

Whitefield  (hwit'field),George,72i,  n. 

Wilfred,  380. 

William  I.,  the  Conqueror,  k.  of  Eng- 
land, 434-436;  II.,  the  Red,  436,  n. 

William  III.,  k.  of  England,  his  part 
in  the  Revolution  of  1688,  623, 
624;   reign,  626-628. 

William  I.,  k.  of  Prussia,  703;  be- 
comes emp.  of  the  New  German 
Empire,  707. 

William  I.,  the  Silent.  See  Orange, 
William  of. 

Winfred.     See  St.  Boniface. 

Winkelried  (wink'el-reet),  Arnold  of, 
506. 

Witan,  the,  433. 

Witikind  (wit'i-kind),  406. 

Woden,  379. 

Wolfe,  Major-General,  631. 

Wolseley,  Lord,  in  Egypt,  728. 

Wolsey,  Cardinal,  543,  545. 

Woman,  social  position  of,  among 
the  Greeks,  216,  217. 

Worcester  (woos'ter),  battle  of,  614. 


Worms,  diet  of,  523,  524. 
Wiir'tem-burg,   duchy   of,   in   Thirty 

Years'  War,  588. 
Wycliffe  (wik'lif),  490,  491. 

Xan-thip'pe,  206. 
Xavier  (zav'i-er),  Francis,  528. 
Xen'o-phon,  156,  198. 
Xeres  (ha-res'),  battle  of,  398. 
Xerxes  (zerks'es)  I.,  k.  of  Persia,  80, 
81. 

York,  d.  of,  621. 

York,  house  of,  479,  n.;   badge  of, 

488.     See  Roses,   Wars  of  the. 
Yuste  (yoos'ta),  monastery  of,  534. 

Zaandam  (zan'dam'),  635. 
Za'gros  Mountains,  59,  60. 
Za'ma,  battle  of,  264,  265. 
Zealand,  567,  568. 
Zed'e-ki'ah,  k.  of  Judah,  68. 
Ze'la,  battle  of,  296. 
Zend'a-ves'ta,  the,  83. 
Ze'no,  210. 

Ze'no,  Roman  emp.  in  the  East,  348. 
Ze-no'bi-a,  329. 

Zeus,  I02j   oracles  of,  104,  105. 
Zeuxis  (zuks'iss),  189. 
Zorn'dorf,  battle  of,  646. 
Zo-ro-as'ter,  83. 
Zoroastrianism,  83,  84. 
Zut'phen,  siege  of,  570. 
Zwingle,  Ulrich  (zwing'gl,  ool'rik), 
525- 


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